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BX  6332  .M3  1898 
MacArthur,  Robert  Stuart, 

1841-1923. 
Current  questions  for 

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CURRENT  QUESTIONS 


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URRENT  QUESTIONS 
FOR  THINKDMG  MEN 


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By/ 
ROBERT  STUART  MAC  ARTHUR 


Philadelphia 

Bmcrtcan  ^Baptist  ipublication  Society 
MDCCCXCVm 


Copyright  1898  by  the 
American  Baptist  Publication  Society 


ffrom  tbc  Societie's  own  ipress 


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NOTE 

The  papers  contained  in  this  book  were  deliv- 
ered at  different  times  and  under  different  circum- 
stances, as  will  appear  in  detail  in  the  footnotes 
accompanying  them.  The  abiding  importance  of 
the  themes  discussed,  as  well  as  a  desire  very  gen- 
erally expressed,  has  prompted  the  gathering  of 
them  together  in  this  more  permanent  form.  It 
is  hoped  that  in  this  form  whatever  of  good  is  in 
them  may  find  a  more  potent  voice,  and  win  in 
the    wider   audience    thus    addressed,    a    friendly 

hearing. 

R.  S.  MacA. 

Calvary  Study,  January,  1898. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

I.  The  Scholar  in  the  World 1 1 

II.  Characteristics  of  True  Culture  ....    38 

III.  Christianity  and  the  Secular  Spirit  ...    67 

IV.  Reasons  for  Being  a  Baptist 89 

V.  Baptist  Polity  and  Historic  Creeds  .    .    .114 

VI.  Historic  Baptist  Principles 136 

VII.  Partial  Unification  by  Possible  Elimina- 
tion     171 

VIII.  Greater  Baptist  Efficiency 189 

IX.  Pressing  Needs  of  Foreign  Fields  .    .    .    .214 

X.  Establishing  Our  Work  ...    ■ 245 

XI.  The  Organization  of  a  Church 271 

XII.  The  Development  of  the  Church  .    .    .    .291 

XIII.  The  Selection  of  a  Church 310 

XIV.  The  Christian  Year 325 

XV.  Separation  Between  Church  and  State  .    .  342 

XVI.  The  Regeneration  of  a  Race 365 

XVII.  The  True  Function  of  the  Minister   .    .    .  395 


CURRENT  QUESTIONS  FOR  THINKING  MEN 


I 

THE   SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  ^ 

THE  subject  to  which  attention  is  called  this 
evening  is,  The  Scholar  in  the  World.  Is 
the  term  scholar  synonymous  with  the  term  college 
graduate  ?  This  cannot  be  affirmed.  There  are 
scholars  who  are  not  college  graduates  ;  and  there 
are  college  graduates  who  are  not  scholars.  Some 
graduates  have  not  the  habits,  tastes,  or  instincts  of 
scholars.  It  is  not  the  business  of  a  college  to  fur- 
nish brains.  A  college  is  a  mill,  and  the  character 
of  the  flour  which  comes  from  the  sieve  depends 
largely  upon  the  quality  of  the  grain  which  goes 
into  the  hopper.  No  college  faculty  can  get  some- 
thing out  of  nothing.  You  can  highly  polish  maple 
or  marble  ;  you  cannot  polish  cheese  or  chalk.  It 
has  been  often  and  conclusively  demonstrated  that 
money  cannot  purchase  capacity.  A  fool  brayed 
in  the  college  mortar,  even  with  the  best  presiden- 
tial pestle,  is  a  fool  still.  Doubtless  he  will  be 
profited  by  the  braying  ;  somewhat  of  his  foolish- 

^  Delivered  at  the  Commencement  of  the  Columbian  University, 
Washington,  D.  C,  June  9,  1896. 

II 


12       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

ness  will  have  departed  from  him  by  the  time  of  his 
graduation.  The  man  who  by  the  special  grace  of 
the  faculty  dangles  along  at  the  tail  of  his  class  gets 
some  good  in  the  dangling.  In  the  college  class- 
room he  takes  in  as  much  of  the  literary  atmosphere 
as  his  contracted  intellectual  lungs  will  admit.  In 
association  with  those  who  are  scholars  he  takes  in 
by  friction  as  much  as  his  rhinocerial  epidermis  can 
absorb.  If  after  the  advantages  of  a  college  course 
there  is  so  great  stupidity,  how  enormous  would 
that  stupidity  have  been  had  there  been  no  college 
course.  The  stupidity  is  not  because  of,  but  in 
spite  of,  the  training  received. 

On  the  other  hand,  those  who  are  scholars  but 
not  college  graduates  are  such  in  spite  of  their  dis- 
advantages. Given  the  college  training,  and  how 
much  more  complete,  symmetrical,  and  polished 
their  scholarship  would  be.  All  men  who  are  made 
at  all  are  self-made  ;  no  college  can  make  a  man. 
Colleges  simply  help  men  to  make  themselves.  A 
college  sharpens  nature's  tools  and  teaches  their 
right  use.  You  may  with  one  hand  hold  on  the 
grindstone  the  chisel  with  which  you  are  to  carve 
out  fame  and  fortune  ;  and  you  may  turn  the  stone 
with  the  other  hand.  But  if  you  could  hold  the 
chisel  with  both  hands  while  the  college  faculty 
turned  the  stone,  your  chances  for  a  fine  edged  tool 
would  be  wonderfully  improved.  Unfortunately 
scholar  and  graduate  are  not  equivalent  terms  ;  but 
for  the  purposes  of  this  discussion,  we  shall  regard 
them  as  synonymous. 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  1 3 

THE   SCHOLAR    IN    BUSINESS. 

Consider  then  the  scholar  in  business  hfe.  For 
business  colleges  it  is  difficult  to  have  much  re- 
spect. For  colleges  which  mean  business  it  is  im- 
possible not  to  have  great  admiration.  Scholar- 
ship is  needed  in  business  life  to-day  as  never  be- 
fore ;  first,  because  the  relations  of  business  life  are 
now  so  far-reaching.  The  world  is  both  larger  and 
smaller  than  ever  before  ;  it  is  larger  when  we  re- 
gard its  necessary  points  of  contact  with  our  daily 
lives,  and  smaller  when  we  regard  the  facility 
with  which  the  contact  is  made.  There  are  no 
hermit  nations.  Inspired  by  a  unifying  and  sym- 
pathetic impulse  the  nations  have  risen  above 
their  former  boundaries,  and  have  mingled  their 
liberated  waters  in  one  great  ocean  of  inter- 
national life  and  Christian  endeavor.  Steamships 
and  railways  make  distant  continents  near  neigh- 
bors. Telegraphs  and  telephones  have  made  the 
world  a  whispering  gallery.  They  have  changed 
the  business,  the  diplomacy,  the  civilization  of  the 
century.  They  repeat  on  a  gigantic  scale  the  mar- 
vels of  each  man's  own  nervous  system. 

With  bowed  head  and  uplifted  heart  all  Christen- 
dom stood  a  few  years  ago  by  the  bedside  of  Gen- 
eral Garfield  while  he  was  fighting  his  terrible  bat- 
tle. In  the  capitals  of  the  world  his  pulsebeats 
were  counted  ;  princes  and  peasants  listened  with 
mingled  hope  and  fear  for  his  heart  throbs.  All 
the  world  was  kin   as  it   watched    General   Grant 


14       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

fighting  the  only  enemy  whom  he  could  not  con- 
quer. Such  kinship  was  impossible  a  generation 
ago  ;  such  community  of  knowledge  and  interest 
will  do  much  to  unite  the  world  in  the  bonds  of  per- 
petual brotherhood.  Every  morning  the  ends  of 
the  earth  meet  in  the  paper  at  our  breakfast  tables. 
In  this  day  merchants  deal  with  peoples  of  various 
climes,  colors,  languages,  and  religions.  Soon  the 
Congo  Valley  will  be  as  familiar  to  our  thought  and 
speech  as  is  the  valley  of  the  Mississippi.  Already 
goods  are  shipped  from  our  ports  to  the  corners  of 
the  earth  ;  already  are  new  branches  of  trade  pre- 
paring to  enter  these  new  and  vast  fields  of  com- 
mercial enterprise.  India  is  as  near  to-day  as 
Liverpool  was  a  generation  ago.  To-day  a  mer- 
chant or  manufacturer  ought  to  know  the  history, 
the  products,  the  needs,  the  habits,  and  the  tastes  of 
at  least  half  a  dozen  nations.  The  successful  busi- 
ness man  of  a  past  generation,  if  he  followed  the 
old  methods,  would  be  a  helpless  dwarf  amid  the 
tremendous  giants  of  to-day.  Does  a  man  tell  me 
that  a  business  man  to-day  does  not  need  scholar- 
ship both  vast  and  varied  ?  Then  I  ask  where  has 
he  lived  ?  In  what  sunless  hole  has  he  burrowed  ? 
Our  most  kingly  merchant  princes  find  an  ever- 
widening  sphere  for  the  employment  of  all  their 
faculties  and  abilities  in  the  tremendous  rush  and 
roar  of  the  world-embracing  possibilities  in  the 
marts  of  trade  and  commerce  of  our  day. 

But,  again,  scholarship  is  needed  in  business  life 
because  it  is  the  open  door  to  other  spheres  of 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  1 5 

intellectual  activity.  Business  men  now  abound  in 
the  halls  of  State  and  national  legislation.  The 
wealth  acquired  in  business  gives  influence,  some- 
times legitimate  and  sometimes  not,  in  nominating 
conventions  and  at  polling  booths.  Not  in  name, 
but  not  the  less  in  fact,  does  wealth  buy  seats  in 
legislative  halls.  The  same  thing  sometimes  is  true, 
it  is  more  than  hinted,  in  regard  to  selections  for 
cabinets  and  appointments  for  foreign  missions. 
For  some  years  the  tendency  has  been  to  push 
business  men  into  these  positions  of  prominence 
and  power.  The  preparation  and  presentation  of 
bills  come  into  their  hands.  Clearness  of  thought 
and  forcefulness  of  statement  thus  become  an  ab- 
solute necessity.  There  can  be  no  clearness  of 
speech  except  there  be  first  clearness  of  thought ; 
inaccuracy  of  speaking  is  always  preceded  by 
looseness  of  thinking.  "What  you  know  you  can 
tell,"  is  a  remark  as  truthful  as  it  used  to  be  familiar 
to  students  while  under  President  Martin  B.  Ander- 
son's instruction.  The  training  of  the  parliamentary 
orator  as  a  great  and  clear  thinker  is  the  first  step 
in  his  career.  It  is  a  matter  of  vast  importance. 
No  matter  how  great  and  varied  the  gifts  of  nature 
may  be,  they  need  to  be  supplemented  by  the 
broadest  and  most  accurate  training  attainable. 
Genius,  real  or  imagined,  which  denies  the  neces- 
sity of  adequate  preparation  for  hard  work  in  any 
business  career  is  a  doubtful  or  dangerous  posses- 
sion. Business  men  are  in,  and  must  continue  to 
be  in,  political  life.     This  is  inevitable.     Young  men 


1 6       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

in  preparing  for  business  life  should  prepare  also 
for  that  to  which  it  may  lead.  Their  scholarship 
should  be  broad,  accurate,  and  usable  alike  in  their 
business  life  and  in  their  political  career. 

Again,  scholarship  in  business  life  is  necessary  in 
order  to  enjoy  a  well-earned  leisure.  Success  in  a 
business  life  brings  wealth  ;  wealth  makes  leisure 
possible  ;  and  leisure  to  be  a  blessing,  must  be 
associated  with  some  degree  of  intellectual  culture. 
Wealth  and  ignorance  make  a  sorry  team.  The 
more  his  wealth  exalts  an  ignorant  man  the  more 
sadly  conspicuous  does  his  ignorance  become.  Such 
a  man  can  only  "talk  shop."  He  has  no  intellec- 
tual resources.  He  has  no  knowledge  of  and  no 
enjoyment  in  books.  He  may  buy  them  by  the 
yard,  because  it  is  "the  thing"  to  have  a  library; 
but  to  him  they  are,  for  the  most  part,  in  an  un- 
known tongue.  The  man  is  in  danger  of  drifting 
into  a  fast  life,  or  of  becoming  the  hopeless  dupe 
of  designing  men,  or  of  sinking  into  an  idiotic 
ennuye.  These  are  the  men  and  the  families  who, 
so  far  as  in  them  lies,  make  America  ridiculous  in 
all  European  resorts.  These  are  the  men  who  fur- 
nish material  for  the  well-deserved  satires  on  our 
circles  of  society  in  which  "  Mr.  Newrich  "  is  the 
conspicuous  figure.  They  give  the  "  Buntling  Balls  " 
of  the  hour.  They  are  the  travelers  who  from  Euro- 
pean wanderings  return  : 

Across  Atlantic's  many-sounding  deep, 

Borne  safe  between  the  stanch  Cunarder's  ribs, 

Wave-furrowing,  tempest-baffling,  huge  of  bulk. 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  1 7 

God  pity  Alonzo,  Anastasia,  and  Jane  Buntling ! 
The  brainless  and  moneyless  dudes  who  enjoy 
their  hospitality  and  make  fun  of  their  stupidity 
as  they  sing  : 

•  •  Old  man,  do  not  be  nonsensical 
In  your  views  about  New  York  ; 
You  are  needlessly  forensical 
For  a  potentate  in  pork, ' ' 

are  more  to  be  blamed  but  not  more  to  be  pitied 
than  their  ignorant  and  ambitious  hosts.  The  man 
with  learning  will  know  how  to  enjoy  leisure.  The 
art  of  the  world  will  find  in  him  an  admiration 
which  his  previous  knowledge  has  prepared  him  to 
bestow.  In  poverty  he  has  within  himself  resources 
of  inestimable  value.  In  wealth,  even  though  it 
comes  suddenly,  he  has  self-poise  ;  he  has  taste, 
culture,  enjoyment.  It  is  simply  a  question  of  man- 
hood. Shall  a  man  be  broad-minded,  many-sided, 
and  symmetrical,  or  shall  he  sink  to  what,  I  sup- 
pose, the  Concord  philosophers  would  call  a  con- 
dition of  "thingness."  God  help  us  all  to  under- 
stand the  grandeur  of  being  men  and  women, 
disciples  of  true  culture,  and  heirs  of  eternal  glory. 

THE   SCHOLAR    IN    POLITICAL    LIFE. 

Let  us  now  look  at  the  scholar  in  political  life. 
The  whole  range  of  political  life  is  much  in  need 
of  elevation.  We  have  grown  weary  of  the  tyran- 
nical reign  of  the  corner  groggery  and  ward  pol- 
itician— both  positions  being  often  represented  by 

B 


1 8       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

one  and  the  same  man.  We  ought  to  insist  that 
some  classes  of  men  should  at  least  get  rid  of  a 
little  of  their  brogue  before  they  attempt  to  lord  it 
over  native-born  Americans.  As  I  myself  am  not 
a  native-born  American  I  may  make  this  remark. 
There  is  almost  enough  in  American  politics  to 
justify  a  lugubrious  and  pessimistic  allusion  to  the 
subject.  But  we  and  not  our  stars  are  to  blame 
that  we  are  underlings.  Our  best  men  must  go 
into  politics.  The  worse  the  condition  of  affairs 
the  more  are  the  best  men  needed.  It  is  worse 
than  useless  to  stand  aloof,  in  white-robed  idleness, 
and  declaim  against  the  "dirty  pool"  of  politics. 
Of  course  it  is  dirty  ;  some  men  make  their  living 
by  keeping  it  so.  They  will  never  purify  it.  They 
are  perfectly  willing  to  have  you  declaim  against  it, 
so  long  as  you  only  declaim.  Go  yourself  to  the 
primaries,  to  the  polls,  to  all  centers  of  political 
power.  Culture  and  religion  which  are  too  good 
to  be  used  for  the  political  welfare  of  the  people 
are  useless  adornments,  are  worthless  impedi- 
menta. Here  is  a  sphere  for  the  true  scholar ; 
and  it  is  a  sphere  worthy  of  his  noblest  ambitions. 
The  politician  needs  scholarship  that  as  a  speaker 
he  may  be  popular  with  the  uneducated.  It  is 
often  said  that  an  educated  man  cannot  so  address 
an  audience  as  to  interest  uneducated  hearers.  If 
a  public  speaker  fails  it  is  not  because  he  is  edu- 
cated, but  because  he  is  only  half-educated.  The 
aim  of  education  is  not  to  mystify  but  to  simplify. 
The  educated  man  is  taller  than  the  uneducated. 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  1 9 

It  is  his  business  to  take  down  difficult  truths  and 
make  them  so  plain  that  the  uneducated  mind  can 
readily  grasp  and  firmly  hold  them.  It  is  his 
business  to  make  an  intelligent  diagnosis  of  the 
mental  capacity  of  his  audience  and  then  prescribe 
his  truth  in  such  doses  as  the  facts  may  require 
and  demand.  It  is  his  business  in  speaking  to  a 
popular  audience  to  take  the  truth  he  wishes  to 
impart  out  of  its  technical  forms  of  phraseology 
and  put  it  into  plain,  everyday  speech.  The  man 
who  cannot  do  that  is  uneducated,  even  although 
he  may  have  the  diplomas  of  many  schools.  He 
is  unintelligible  because  he  is  unintelligent ;  he  is 
grandiloquent  and  obscure  because  he  is  stupid. 
He  must  know  how — to  use  a  word  which  Oliver 
Wendell  Holmes  uses  in  this  sense — to  "depolar- 
ize "  his  thought,  taking  it  out  of  professional  ter- 
minology and  putting  it  into  plain  speech. 

The  speaker  or  writer  who  uses  the  language  of 
the  shop,  the  trade,  or  the  schools  in  addressing  a 
popular  audience  shows  not  his  wealth  but  his  pov- 
erty of  thought  and  speech.  "  How  much  learn- 
ing," Archbishop  Leigh  ton  used  to  say,  "  it  takes  to 
be  simple."  In  my  early  ministry,  fresh  from  the 
theological  seminary,  I  stupidly  threw  at  the  con- 
gregation these  two  words  "supralapsarianism"  and 
"sublapsarianism."  Had  I  maliciously  thrown  at 
the  people  the  pulpit  Bible  or  hymn  book,  I  could 
scarcely  have  produced  a  greater  sensation.  Fuller 
knowledge  enables  a  man  to  take  the  meaning 
out  of  such  words  and   give   it  to  the  public  in 


20       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

simple  forms  of  speech.  "Big  words"  when  ad- 
dressing a  popular  and  not  a  technical  audience, 
are  a  sure  sign  of  ignorance.  The  terminology  of 
any  science,  art,  or  profession  may  be  used,  of 
course,  when  addressing  the  students  of  that  sci- 
ence, art,  or  profession.  The  commonest  mob  does 
not  relish  the  shirt -sleeved,  grammar -breaking, 
word-slinging  style  of  the  sand-lots  orator.  The 
most  ignorant  assemblies  know  better  than  to  enjoy 
an  insult  to  their  common  sense. 

Few  men  could  better  address  a  New  York  mob 
than  Horatio  Seymour.  The  crowd  understood 
him  perfectly  ;  indeed,  there  are  many  who  honestly 
thought  that  he  was  understood  too  well,  when  on  a 
certain  memorable  occasion  he  addressed  the  rioters 
as  "my  friends."  He  never  forgot  his  dignity,  and 
his  scholarship,  nor  his  elegance  in  dress  or  ad- 
dress. He  was  sufficiently  well  educated  to  adapt 
his  knowledge  to  the  capacity  of  his  average  hearer. 
There  are  few  speakers  in  the  political  field  to-day 
who  can  more  fully  interest  and  inspire  the  usual 
political  crowd  than  Chauncey  M.  Depew.  At  the 
same  time  men  pf  the  highest  culture  are  charmed 
by  his  logical  reasoning,  his  accurate  knowledge, 
and  his  polished  oratory.  The  names  of  many 
more  in  political,  legal,  and  other  walks  of  life  could 
be  cited  to  illustrate  this  point. 

The  same  principles  apply  to  pulpit  oratory. 
From  Chrysostom  to  Wesley  and  Spurgeon  the 
great  preachers  were  those  whom  the  common  peo- 
ple heard  gladly ;  they  were  at  the  same  time  men 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  21 

at  whose  feet  culture  could  and  did  learn  lessons  of 
wisdom.  Mr.  Spurgeon  was  in  many  well-under- 
stood respects  the  greatest  preacher  since  the  days  of 
the  apostles.  He  was  always  simple  and  forceful  ; 
he  was  sometimes  witty  and  homely  ;  but  never  did 
he  forget  the  glory  of  his  message  nor  the  character 
which  becomes  the  messenger.  Within  his  very 
much  smaller  circle  Mr.  Moody  is  educated  ;  and 
his  success  bears  a  close  relation  to  his  education. 
Regarding  the  subjects  of  which  chiefly  he  speaks 
he  is  educated.  His  remarkable  power  is  in  spite 
of  the  fact  that  often  he  mispronounces  words  and 
violates  grammatical  rules.  He  who  "spake  as 
never  man  spake"  was  heard  gladly  by  the  com- 
mon people,  and  yet  even  as  a  boy  the  learned 
doctors  were  astonished  at  the  questions  he  asked 
and  the  answers  he  gave. 

Scholarship  is  needed  in  political  life  rightly  to 
apprehend  and  forcefully  to  discuss  the  questions 
now  agitating  public  thought.  Great  questions  are 
before  us  ;  their  discussion  cannot  much  longer  be 
postponed.  Socialism,  often  passing  over  into  an- 
archism, clamors  for  a  hearing.  Let  it  be  heard. 
Talking  will  do  its  advocates  great  good.  Discus- 
sion of  subjects  largely  erroneous  liberates  their 
truths,  which  become  the  antidote  to  their  errors. 
Discussion  of  all  political  heresies  will  manifest  the 
element  of  truth  which  they  contain  ;  and  at  the 
same  time  it  will  expose  their  falsity  in  statement 
and  their  fallacy  in  reasoning.  The  temperance 
question  in  its  political  aspects  must  be  discussed. 


22       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  tariff  question  must  be  discussed  ;  so  also  must 
questions  of  restricted  immigration,  of  protected 
suffrage,  of  civil  service  reform,  of  arbitration,  and 
of  annexation.  These  discussions  must  not  be  on 
the  basis  of  narrow  partisan  politics.  .Here  there 
is  a  field  for  the  exercise  of  the  broadest  scholar- 
ship, the  profoundest  reasoning,  and  the  wisest 
statesmanship.  Where  are  the  statesmen  compe- 
tent to  deal  with  these  and  similar  questions?  The 
very  name  statesman  has  almost  become  a  reproach. 
When  the  infamous  Tweed  was  asked  to  name  his 
occupation  he  replied,  "statesman";  when  asked 
his  religion  he  said,  "none."  The  latter  answer  was 
certainly  correct.  To-day  he  has  his  imitators. 
Ignorance  and  irreligion  are  marked  features  of  the 
"practical  statesman."  From  this  sort  of  states- 
manship, scholarship  and  religion  are  virtually  di- 
vorced. "Them  literary  fellows  "  have  been  held 
in  great  contempt  by  the  average  statesman.  Well, 
the  contempt  is  mutual.  Some  of  the  literary, 
political  dilettanti  are  worthy  of  the  contempt  in 
which  they  are  held  by  others  than  the  "  practical 
politician."  But  in  politics  there  is  a  sphere  for 
scholarship  that  is  associated  with  a  manliness  which 
is  worthy  of  all  honor.  The  man  of  broad  scholar- 
ship, of  commanding  eloquence,  and  of  spotless 
character  has  to-day  a  boundless  field,  a  sure  tri- 
umph, and  an  enduring  fame  in  American  politics. 
We  are  weary  of  putting  men  up  as  candidates 
merely  because  they  are  "available";  and  often 
available  chiefly  because  they  are  unknowing  and 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  23 

unknown.  Both  parties  to-day  need  leaders — lead- 
ers of  scholarship,  statesmanship,  eloquence,  and 
character.     Where  are  the  men  to  be  found  ? 

Political  life  in  our  day  is  not  so  commonplace 
as  many  suppose ;  the  heroic  days  of  the  republic 
are  not  all  in  the  past.  We  are  in  the  midst  of 
wars  and  rumors  of  wars.  "Happy  is  the  nation 
that  has  no  history"  has  become  a  proverb.  But 
the  nation  that  has  no  history  has  not  much  of 
anything;  it  has  no  statesmen,  no  thinkers,  no 
orators.  The  comparatively  recent  volume  entitled 
"Representative  American  Orations"  shows  clearly 
that  the  causes  which  make  history  possible  make 
statesmanship  and  oratory  certain.  Webster  truly 
said,  "True  eloquence  cannot  be  brought  from 
afar ;  it  must  exist  in  the  man,  in  the  subject,  and 
in  the  occasion."  Our  revolutionary  days  awoke 
and  immortalized  the  voice  of  Patrick  Henry. 
Discussions  connected  with  the  formulation  of  the 
Constitution  called  out  the  powers  of  Jefferson  and 
Hamilton.  The  War  of  1 8 1 2  gave  us  the  speeches 
of  John  Randolph  and  Henry  Clay.  The  expo- 
sition of  the  Constitution  gave  us  the  wily  Calhoun 
and  the  gigantic  Webster,  The  antislavery  discus- 
sions gave  us  Garrison  and  Phillips,  Seward  and 
Sumner.  In  the  city  of  Rochester,  N.  Y.,  Seward 
said  :  "I  know  and  you  know  that  a  revolution  has 
begun  ;  I  know  and  all  the  world  knows  that  revo- 
lution never  goes  backward." 

The  war  gave  us  Lincoln,  Grant,  and  many  more 
who  are  among  the  immortals.      In  many  of  these 


24       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

men  we  have  grand  illustrations  of  how  scholarship, 
patriotism,  and  character  became  the  handmaids  of 
martial,  political,  and  patriotic  power  and  glory. 
These  men  were  giants.  Who  to-day  is  worthy  to 
be  the  successors  of  leaders  so  illustrious?  So  we 
often  ask;  but  the  resources  of  the  Republic  are 
not  exhausted.  Should  similar  occasions  arise, 
similar  leaders  will  arise  also.  In  every  crisis  of 
our  national  life  God  has  given  us  wise,  heroic,  and 
patriotic  leaders.  He  will  not  desert  us  in  future 
national  trials  should  they  arise. 

When  we  look  across  the  Atlantic,  we  see  what 
a  practical,  general,  and  honored  place  scholarship 
has  in  political  life.  The  list  of  names  is  so  long 
and  so  brilliant  that  one  does  not  know  where  to 
begin  or  to  end  its  examination.  Not  to  go  too 
far  back,  we  take  the  name  of  William  Pitt,  who 
was  as  famous  for  scholarship  in  his  boyhood  as  for 
his  imposing  appearance,  attractive  oratory,  and 
irreproachable  character  in  his  manhood.  We 
have  the  names  of  Sir  Robert  Peel,  who  upon  his 
graduation  at  Christ  Church,  Oxford,  in  1808,  took 
a  double  first-class.  The  Earl  of  Derby,  gradu- 
ating in  1 8 19,  gained  the  Latin  verse  prize,  and 
soon  became  a  debater  of  the  very  first  rank.  Tall 
in  figure,  commanding  in  gesture,  with  a  voice 
which  rang  out  with  tremendous  power,  he  was 
a  man  to  be  admired  and  feared.  In  the  midst 
of  a  career  of  great  activity  he  found  time  to 
cultivate  his  scholarly  tastes,  and  his  later  years 
were  devoted  to  translating  Homer's  "Iliad,"  two 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  25 

volumes  of  which  were  published  in  blank  verse 
in  1864. 

We  think  of  Lord  Macaulay  in  connection  with 
literature  rather  than  in  connection  with  statesman- 
ship ;  but  he  would  have  been  famous  as  a  states- 
man had  he  not  been  so  brilliant  as  a  writer.  At  the 
age  of  eighteen,  at  Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  he 
had  acquired  a  great  reputation  both  as  a  debater 
and  a  scholar.  We  know  that  twice  he  won  the 
chancellor's  medal;  first,  in  1819,  for  a  poem  on 
"Pompeii,"  and,  a  year  later,  for  a  poem  on 
"Evening."  While  war  secretary  he  composed 
his  magnificent  war  ballads,  "The  Lays  of  Ancient 
Rome."  His  scholarship  was  brilliant,  and  his 
literary  acquisitions  were  simply  prodigious.  He 
was  an  immense  accession  to  the  Whig  party; 
indeed,  his  history  has  been  called  "a  huge  Whig 
pamphlet."  His  nephew,  himself  an  illustration  of 
the  scholar  in  politics,  has  given  us  in  his  uncle's 
"Life  and  Letters"  one  of  the  most  fascinating 
biographies  of  this  generation. 

The  Duke  of  Argyle  adds  to  the  glory  of  his  an- 
cestral name  by  his  books,  which  unite  in  beautiful 
harmony  high  scholarship  with  lowly  Christian  faith. 
Authorship  and  statesmanship  almost  equally  di- 
vided the  honors  of  the  dashing  leader  of  English 
Jingoism.  What  shall  we  say  of  Disraeli's  great 
rival,  the  foremost  man  in  the  world  to-day,  the 
gigantic  Gladstone.  He  closed  his  brilliant  college 
career  at  Christ  Church,  Oxford,  in  183 1,  where  he 
took  a  double  first-class  degree.      The  next  year 


26       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

he  entered  the  House  of  Commons.  Well  might 
Macaulay,  in  1838,  speak  of  him  as  "a  young  man 
of  unblemished  character,  the  rising  hope  of  those 
stern  and  unbending  Tories."  Behold  him  in  1858 
publishing  in  three  volumes  his  elaborate  work  on 
"Homer  and  the  Homeric  Age,"  and  in  1875  his 
"Homeric  Synchronism."  But  we  cannot  follow 
him  along  the  line  of  great  statesmanship  and 
equally  great  scholarship.  This  grand  man  stirs 
us  profoundly ;  he  arouses  our  utmost  enthusiasm. 
In  him  we  have  the  able  statesman,  the  great 
scholar,  and  the  humble  Christian  happily  blended. 
He  is  peerless  in  the  whole  world  to-day.  He 
grows  grander  as  the  shadows  of  evening  gather 
about  him.  His  name  will  live  long  in  the  history 
of  literature  and  statesmanship.  He  is  the  un- 
crowned king  of  Britain  and  of  the  world  to-day. 
God  give  the  "old  man  eloquent"  his  benediction 
in  the  closing  years  of  his  heroic  life ! 

But  again,  we  need  scholarship  in  political  life 
that  our  country  may  be  rightly  represented  abroad. 
Appointments  to  foreign  courts  should  be  made 
on  other  grounds  than  the  payment  of  political  debts. 
Walpole  long  ago  said  that  an  ambassador  is  a  man 
sent  abroad  to  lie  for  his  country.  If  all  politicians 
who  are  adepts  in  that  art  were  sent  abroad,  the 
number  of  applicants  for  offices  at  home  would  be 
greatly  reduced.  In  these  foreign  positions  certain 
lines  of  scholarship  are  absolutely  necessary  to  the 
preservation  of  the  dignity  of  the  country.  Here, 
at  least,  Civil  Semce  Reform  should  have  its  com- 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  2'] 

plete  illustration.  We  gratefully  acknowledge  the 
superb  service  and  high  character  of  some  of  our 
ambassadors  to  foreign  courts.  But  we  must  also 
with  equal  honesty  mourn  over  the  incapacity  of 
others.  It  is  simply  ridiculous  to  send  to  foreign 
countries  men  ignorant  of  their  language,  their  his- 
tory, their  laws,  and  their  social  customs.  We  need 
a  school  for  the  training  of  men  for  these  positions. 
Let  Columbian  University  be  that  school,  and  let 
us  lift  the  whole  range  of  political  life,  making  for- 
eign appointments  on  the  ground  of  fitness  and  not 
as  a  reward  for  party  services.  We  have  too  few 
men  in  political  life  who  can  fill  prominent  places 
at  European  courts.  We  have  been  too  often  humili- 
ated alike  by  the  ignorance  and  the  character  of  men 
who  misrepresented  their  country. 

Along  the  whole  line  of  political  life  we  must 
strive  to  raise  the  standard  of  political  morality. 
Our  motto  should  be  :  "Fewer  elections  and  better." 
This  nation  is  now  too  great  to  be  disturbed  by  the 
excitements  which  quadrennial  national  elections 
inevitably  produce.  Its  volume  of  business  is  too 
great  to  be  thus  imperiled.  Its  money  interests 
are  too  sensitive  to  be  thus  agitated,  and  its  time 
is  too  precious  to  be  thus  squandered.  The  returns 
in  increased  knowledge  of  political  affairs  and  in 
oratorical  skill  thus  developed  are  not  an  adequate 
compensation  for  the  injuries  which  all  forms  of 
business  receive.  Let  the  presidential  term  be  six 
or  eight  years,  and  let  no  president  be  eligible  for 
re-election.    Then  the  evils  of  so  frequent  elections 


28       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

will  be  avoided,  and  presidents  will  attend  to  their 
proper  duties  instead  of  spending  so  much  time  in 
laying  plans  for  re-election. 

We  must  also  insist  upon  an  improved  civil  serv- 
ice, both  at  home  and  abroad.  Present  efforts  in 
that  direction  show  marked  progress  and  give  high 
hopes  for  the  future.  We  must  have  the  best  men 
in  the  community  take  an  active  interest  in  politics, 
beginning  with  the  primaries  ;  we  must  insist  upon 
scholarship  on  the  part  of  the  men  who  represent  us 
in  the  halls  of  State  and  national  legislation  ;  but 
most  of  all  we  must  insist  on  the  recognition  of  high 
moral  principles  in  all  departments  of  political  life. 
We  must  insist  on  this  great  saying  of  a  brilliant  man, 
"  Nothing  can  be  politically  right  which  is  morally 
wrong."  We  must  believe  it.  God  rules.  Right 
wins.  Wrong  shall  yet  go  to  the  cross.  Right  shall 
yet  reign  on  the  throne.  Righteousness  exalteth  a 
nation  ;  but  sin  is  the  reproach  of  any  people.  A 
brilliant  senator  sneered  at  the  Golden  Rule  and  the 
Ten  Commandments  in  politics.  They  were  in  this 
connection  only  an  "iridescent  dream  "  ;  well,  he  has 
been  permitted  to  remain  at  home  and  study  the 
iridescence  of  his  dream  while  other  men  are  striv- 
ing to  bring  this  ideal  condition  into  actual  experi- 
ence. The  altar  of  Almighty  God  must  stand  be- 
side the  throne  of  a  nation's  power.  Remove  that 
altar  and  the  throne  will  tremble,  totter,  tumble. 

Finally,  let  me  speak  of  the  scholar  in  profes- 
sional life. 

It  is  common  to  speak  of  the  professions  of  medi- 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  29 

cine,  law,  and  theology  as  the  learned  professions  ; 
but  the  first  two  are  in  danger  of  losing  this  honor. 
Look  over  the  names  of  the  graduates  of  almost 
any  school  of  medicine  or  law,  and  you  will  see  how 
small  is  the  proportion  of  college  graduates  among 
them.  It  is  sad  that  so  many  boys,  fresh  from  the 
farm,  are  rushed  through  a  brief  course  of  study  in 
some  impecunious  and  ambitious  medical  college, 
and  are  then  turned  adrift  to  practise  their  igno- 
rance on  an  innocent  and  unsuspecting  community. 
To  a  considerable  degree  this  is  true  also  of  schools 
of  law  ;  although  in  the  case  of  both  these  schools 
some  improvement  has  recently  been  made.  Schools 
of  theology  have  always  had  a  higher  standard,  and 
lately  it  has  been  made  higher  still.  At  times  it 
seemed  that  the  ministry  would  be  the  only  learned 
profession,  in  the  technical  sense  in  which  the  term 
has  so  long  been  used. 

You  say,  I  magnify  mine  office.  You  are  right. 
The  Apostle  Paul  did  so.  I  believe  in  this  kind  of 
apostolic  succession.  I  plead  for  a  higher  grade  of 
scholarship  in  all  the  professions — and  this  for  good 
reasons.  One  reason  is  in  the  unscholarly  tendency 
of  necessary  professional  drudgery.  There  is  an 
immense  amount  of  this  in  all  forms  of  professional 
work.  The  ideal  and  the  actual  in  a  man's  profes- 
sion differ  widely.  There  is  danger  that  a  profession 
may  become  simply  a  trade.  In  order  that  a  man 
may  make  his  actual  professional  life  approach  his 
ideal  he  must  enter  it  with  much  general  knowledge 
and  special  scholarship.     We  are,  as  a  rule,  in  too 


30       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

great  haste  to  begin  our  work.  We  ought  to  re- 
member that  a  man  has  begun  his  work  when  he  has 
begun  in  earnest  to  prepare  for  it  Men  want  to  be 
in  the  ministry  ;  they  say  that  they  want  to  be  at 
work.  Opportunities  for  the  noblest  in  sanctified 
personal  culture  and  in  service  for  others  are  all 
about  them.  They  neglect  present  opportunity  in 
a  dreamy  hope  of  great  things  to  come  in  some 
misty  future.  Never  was  there  greater  folly. 
Christ  bided  his  time.  He  waited  thirty  years  be- 
fore performing  a  miracle  ;  this  delay  was  itself  al- 
most a  miracle.  Whatever  ripens  fast  decays  soon. 
The  element  of  time  must  enter  into  all  true  culture. 
Mental  products  must  ripen.  Soft,  liquid,  mellow 
notes  can  come  only  from  old  violins.  Boy  preachers 
are  seldom  men  preachers.  Undue  development 
is  a  monstrosity.  This  haste  is  a  symptom  of  the 
times.  It  is  dangerous.  It  must  be  resisted. 
The  man  who  thinks  he  is  a  genius  and  need  not 
go  through  the  ordinary  process  of  preparation  is 
much  in  need  of  going  into  the  Solomonic  mortar 
to  be  brayed.  There  is  danger  that  he  will  soon 
be  braying  in  some  church  pulpit,  if  he  be  not 
brayed  beneath  some  college  pestle.  Perhaps  this 
man  points  to  Horace  Greeley,  to  Spurgeon,  to 
Moody.  Is  he  quite  sure  that  he  is  a  Greeley,  a  Spur- 
geon, or  a  Moody  ? 

Out  of  this  bumptiousness  comes  the  desire  for 
"  soft  electives  "  in  the  college  course.  A  tendency 
of  our  life  is  to  get  something  for  nothing,  some- 
thing without  paying  the  price  in  hard  work.      This 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  3 1 


tendency  shows  itself  in  "short  cuts"  to  profes- 
sional titles  and  employments  ;  it  advertises  itself  in 
wild-cat  speculations  in  business  ;  it  shouts  itself 
hoarse  for  cheap,  and  so  dishonest,  money  ;  it  runs 
mad  in  various  forms  of  gambling.  If  you  want 
pebbles,  go  out  to  the  street  and  find  them  by  the 
handful  ;  but  if  you  want  diamonds  you  must  dig 
for  them.  Recently  one  of  the  most  prominent 
preachers  and  scholars  in  America  said  in  my  hear- 
ing that  "  Harvard's  course  is  in  education  what 
quackery  is  in  the  regular  practice  of  medicine." 
Perhaps  that  remark  was  an  exaggeration,  but  the 
tendency  is  in  that  direction.  The  trend  is  toward 
a  wild  empiricism.  It  will  make  charlatans  but  not 
scholars.  It  is  a  species  of  educational  dilettante- 
ism. 

This  method  of  education  misunderstands  the 
function  of  a  college.  The  academy  gives  instruc- 
tion in  the  elements,  the  college  in  the  principles, 
and  the  professional  school  in  the  applications  of 
education  to  the  practical  uses  of  life.  Let  the  col- 
lege lay  the  broad  foundation  ;  on  that  foundation 
let  the  professional  structure  be  erected.  In  that 
foundation  the  classics  must  have  the  honored  place. 
Say  what  you  will,  the  students  of  the  arts  course 
and  the  students  of  the  scientific  course  in  any  col- 
lege are  very  different  classes  of  men  ;  the  differ- 
ence is  largely  in  favor  of  the  former.  Explain  it 
how  you  may,  the  fact  remains.  The  tree  of  classical 
knowledge  which  has  borne  such  glorious  fruit  all 
through  the  centuries  is  not  now  to  be  cut  down  by 


32       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

any  empirical  axe.  From  that  tree  we  may  have 
to  lop  off  a  twig  here  and  there,  on  that  tree  we 
may  have  to  graft  a  branch  here  and  there,  as  the 
wisdom  and  experience  of  our  best  educators  may 
suggest,  but,  thank  God,  the  tree  will  stand.  Men 
talk  of  science.  But  why  do  they  limit  the  word 
to  natural  science  ?  Is  not  the  study  of  language 
a  study  of  science  ?  Is  not  the  study  of  history  a 
study  of  science  ?  Is  not  the  study  of  mental  phi- 
losophy a  study  of  science  ? 

It  is  this  unseemly  haste  to  enter  professional 
life  which  leads  to  this  tampering  with  the  college 
course.  Wait,  young  men  ;  bide  your  time.  You 
owe  it  to  yourselves  not  to  degrade  your  profession. 
Rather  than  make  the  course  shorter,  I  would 
make  it  longer.  The  standard  of  admission  ought 
to  be  higher;  the  course  of  preparation  ought  to 
be  longer.  It  is  better  for  a  boy  to  enter  college 
a  year  over  eighteen  than  a  year  under  that  age, 
although  I  know  the  tendency  now  is  to  rush  him 
through  when  young.  There  should  be  broad 
culture  in  history  and  in  general  literature  before 
entering  college.  But,  even  then,  is  a  boy  of  that 
age  fit  to  choose  his  course  of  study?  To  ask  the 
question  is  to  answer  it.  In  this  whole  subject 
there  is  a  golden  mean.  Let  the  boy  enter  thus 
well  prepared,  let  two  years  be  given  to  the  studies 
in  the  regular  course  and  a  certain  standing  be 
attained,  then  let  there  be  an  option — under  wise 
advisers — not  of  studies  but  of  courses  of  study. 
After  graduation,   let  the   professional  studies   be 


THE   SCHOLAR    IN    THE   WORLD  33 

pursued.  After  this  preparation,  the  drudgery  of 
professional  work  will  not  entirely  destroy  scholarly 
tastes ;  and  still  the  true  student  will  feel  that  he  is 
only  a  child  playing  on  the  shore,  while  the  great 
ocean  of  possibility  stretches  before  him  into  infinity. 
Scholarship  is  necessary  in  professional  life  in 
order  that  a  man  may  the  sooner  be  master  of  all 
the  truth  which  his  profession  has  discovered. 
This  is  a  worthy  ambition.  Any  lower  ambition  is 
unworthy  of  a  worthy  man.  The  young  painter 
may  not  expect  to  excel  Raphael,  nor  the  young 
sculptor  Angelo,  but  their  lofty  attainments  will 
stimulate  him  to  nobler  endeavors.  "Young  man," 
said  Emerson,  "hitch  your  wagon  to  a  star." 
That  is  old,  but  it  is  pertinent.  Master  the  last  re- 
sults attained  in  your  profession ;  stand  abreast  of 
its  latest  discoveries.  You  owe  this  to  yourself,  to 
your  clients,  to  your  patients,  to  your  parishioners. 
But  if  you  are  to  have  a  fair  fight  with  inevitable 
indolence,  with  unavoidable  drudgery,  and  with  am- 
bitious competitors,  you  must  not  go  into  the  con- 
flict handicapped  with  ignorance.  You  must  not  be 
weighted  in  the  race.  You  must  run  light  if  you 
would  run  fast.  You  will  need  all  you  know ;  you 
could  use  ten  times  as  much  as  you  know.  The 
man  who  ceases  to  grow  begins  to  die.  Not  to  ad- 
vance is  to  retrograde.  Many  men  in  various  pro- 
fessions died  long  ago.  They  have  not  yet  made 
the  discovery,  but  their  friends  have.  They  are  not 
buried,  but  they  are  certainly  dead.  As  unburied 
corpses  they  walk  about  among  the  living. 


34       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

A  man  must  use  his  college  tools  or  they  will  be- 
come rusty.  To  master  a  profession  to-day  one 
must  enter  it  thoroughly  equipped.  Success  to-day 
is  no  child's  play.  He  who  will  win  the  wreath  of 
victory  must  run  a  brave  race,  and  he  must  feel  the 
prick  of  many  a  thorn.  A  man  may  as  well  count 
the  cost  before  he  flatters  himself  with  the  hope  of 
a  certain  speedy  triumph  in  his  professional  career. 
Ten  out  of  a  hundred  may  win  a  respectable  suc- 
cess ;  perhaps  five  out  of  a  hundred  a  great  success. 
Is  a  young  man  quite  sure  that  he  will  be  one  even 
of  the  ten  ?  Can  he  afford  to  neglect  any  securable 
aid?  How  many  really  great  orators  have  there 
been  in  the  world?  About  one  in  each  five  hun- 
dred years.  Is  a  man  sure  that  he  is  to  be  the  one? 
To  step  into  the  front  rank  a  man  must  have  good 
natural  abilities,  he  must  have  high  acquired  attain- 
ments, and  he  must  have  the  only  genius  worth 
having — the  ability  and  willingness  to  do  tremen- 
dously hard  work,  I  would  not  discourage  any 
man.  I  simply  say  that  no  man  can  afford  in  this 
day  to  dispense  with  a  single  ounce  of  power.  So 
prepared,  go  up,  with  God's  blessing,  and  take  the 
prizes  which  your  profession  offers. 

But  again,  scholarship  is  needed  in  professional 
life  in  order  that  men  may  pay  the  debt  they  owe 
to  their  profession.  No  man  has  a  right  to  be  a 
drone,  a  dunce,  or  even  a  dwarf  in  his  profession. 
No  man  should  submit  to  be  borne  along  on  the 
current  of  professional  opinion.  If  the  course 
flows  in  the  wrong  direction,  he  ought  to  stem  it; 


THE    SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  35 

if  it  flows  in  the  right  direction,  he  ought  to  swell 
it.  What  right  has  a  man  to  tax  the  patience, 
excite  the  pity,  or  merit  the  contempt  of  his  pro- 
fessional brethren?  Some  professions  are  carrying 
along  dead-beats  enough  to  fill  an  ordinary  ceme- 
tery, if  only  they  could  be  induced  to  go  to  their 
own  place.  What  can  be  done  with  these  men? 
The  fault  is  not  in  their  stars,  but  in  themselves,  that 
they  are  dunces.  They  would  be  as  dead  as  they 
are  if  called  by  some  other  professional  name. 
Lazy  men  must  greatly  tax  the  patience  of  God. 
He  has  no  place — at  least  no  good  place — here  or 
hereafter  for  thriftless,  shiftless,  hangers-on  to  the 
various  professions.  But  it  is  not  enough  that  a 
man  should  not  lie  down  in  helpless,  hopeless 
supineness  on  his  profession.  He  should  lift  it  on 
his  manly  shoulders ;  he  should  feel  his  indebted- 
ness to  it  so  much  that  he  would  make  its  indebt- 
edness to  him  unspeakably  great. 

Think  how  much  Blackstone,  Kent,  Story,  and 
Marshall,  as  commentators,  did  for  the  profession 
of  law !  Webster  and  many  others  recognized 
their  obligations  and  met  them  in  other  forms  of 
service.  Think  what  Harvey,  Willard  Parker,  J. 
Marion  Sims,  Koch,  and  others  did  for  medicine ! 
Some  day  some  of  your  own  alumni  may  be  men- 
tioned in  this  category.  The  influence  on  theo- 
logical science  of  Augustine,  Anselm,  Calvin, 
Luther,  and  a  hundred  more,  as  commentators, 
preachers,  and  philanthropists,  neither  man  nor 
angel  can  estimate.     So  of  earnest  workers  in  the 


36       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

professions  of  music,  painting,  sculpture,  architec- 
ture, and  many  other  arts  and  sciences.  Each  has 
its  heroes  and  martyrs,  each  its  diademed  victors, 
its  glorified  saints,  and  now  its  tireless  toilers.  But 
in  order  that  a  man  may  enlarge  the  boundary  of 
the  known  in  his  profession,  he  must  be  able  to 
come  up  to  that  boundary.  You  must  know  what 
has  been  discovered  before  you  can  discover  new 
truths.  You  must  stand  on  the  limits  of  the  dis- 
covered before  you  can  reach  into  untraveled 
realms  of  thought  and  bring  therefrom  grand  truths 
for  other  toilers.  To  do  this  work  you  must  be 
equipped  with  scholarship ;  you  must  know  the 
known  before  you  can  discover  the  unknown. 
Scholarship,  then,  is  necessary  that  you  may  pay 
the  debt  you  owe  your  profession,  yourself,  your 
generation,  and  your  Alma  Mater. 

Gentlemen,  I  have  thus  placed  a  high  standard 
before  you.  I  believe  it  is  as  true  as  it  is  high. 
Who  can  attain  unto  it?  Imperfection  marks  all 
earthly  endeavor  and  attainment.  But  there  is 
growth  in  the  effort  to  grow.  There  may  be  power 
in  our  conscious  need  of  power.  We  have  our 
brief  span  of  life  in  this  nineteenth  century  or  in 
the  opening  years  of  the  twentieth.  It  is  the  noon- 
day of  opportunity.  Our  fathers  saw  this  day  from 
afar,  but  they  only  touched  the  hem  of  oppor- 
tunity's flowing  robe.  The  world  never  saw  a 
more  glorious  era  than  ours.  Forward,  O  men ; 
let  us  do  our  duty ;  angels  can  do  no  more. 

Gentlemen,  with    all   our   getting    may  we   get 


THE   SCHOLAR    IN    THE    WORLD  37 

"understanding."  With  all  our  striving  for  knowl- 
edge may  we  "come  to  the  knowledge  of  the 
truth."  The  school  of  Him  who  "spake  as  never 
man  spake"  is  the  noblest  university.  When  we 
have  been  graduated  from  life's  school,  may  we  be 
matriculated  into  the  higher  learning  of  heaven's 
limitless  knowledge  and  unspeakable  glory ! 


II 

CHARACTERISTICS  OF  TRUE  CULTURE  ^ 

MR.  PRESIDENT  and  Christian  Friends:  I 
thank  you  for  your  cordial  greeting.  It  is 
with  many  and  conflicting  emotions  that  I  rise  in  this 
place  and  on  this  occasion,  in  response  to  the  call 
of  the  chairman.  Many  and  tender  memories  of 
honored  instructors  and  beloved  fellow-students 
who  have  finished  their  course  and  have  entered 
upon  their  rest,  crowd  upon  me  to-day.  Twenty- 
three  years  ago  I  left  this  place  to  embrace  the 
opportunity  for  a  broader  culture  than  was  possible 
here  at  that  time.  Coming  back  to  you  to-day 
thoughts  of  gratitude  to  God  for  his  mercy,  mingled 
with  the  memories  of  which  I  have  spoken,  cluster 
about  this  spot.  I  congratulate  you  all  upon  this 
beautiful  day.  With  no  part  of  the  very  kind  in- 
troduction just  given  me  by  Dr.  Rand  do  I  so 
heartily  agree  as  with  the  reference  to  the  wisdom 
shown  in  the  selection  of  the  day  for  this  memora- 
ble observance.  It  is  surely  right  for  us  to  regard 
this  day  as  an  expression  of  the  kindness  of  our 
Father  in  Heaven.  We  are  certainly  warranted  in 
seeing  in  the  glorious  sunshine  which  now  floods 

^  Delivered    October  22,    1886  at  Woodstock,  Ontario,  at  the 
laying  of  the  cornerstone  of  the  New  Hall,  the  gift  of  Senator 
and  Mrs.  McMaster,  of  the  Woodstock  College. 
38 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF   TRUE    CULTURE  39 

the  world  with  its  splendor,  the  reflection  of  his 
uplifted  countenance  ;  and  in  the  balmy  air  which 
kisses  our  cheek,  we  recognize  his  paternal  bene- 
diction. 

It  is  my  profound  conviction  that  this  day 
marks  an  era  in  the  history  of  our  beloved  de- 
nomination in  Canada ;  that  the  laying  of  this  cor- 
nerstone is  an  epoch-making  event  in  our  educa- 
tional work.  Senator  and  Mrs.  McMaster,  I  am 
quite  well  assured,  will  be  remembered  in  the  years 
to  come  ;  not  so  much  because  of  his  business  suc- 
cess ;  not  so  much  because  of  the  political  honors 
which  have  been  showered  upon  him  ;  not  so  much 
because  of  social  distinction  on  the  part  of  both,  as 
because  of  the  part  which  they  have  taken  in  the 
education  of  young  men  and  women  in  our  de- 
nomination in  Canada.  If  there  were  no  higher 
motives  for  generosity  to  literary  institutions  than 
the  consideration  of  the  worthy  fame  which  they 
give  their  promoters,  this  might  be  one  reason  for 
the  exercise  of  benevolence  in  this  respect. 

The  honor  of  founding  and  aiding  the  great  col- 
leges and  other  institutions  of  learning  in  the  Old 
World  and  the  New,  will  endure  after  all  political  and 
social  successes  have  passed  away.  These  schools 
will  outlive  the  glory  of  kings  and  queens.  Firm 
as  is  the  British  throne  to-day,  it  is  not  so  firm  as 
are  the  great  institutions  of  learning  which  are  the 
pride  and  glory  of  Britain.  Amid  political  conflicts 
the  British  throne  may  totter  and  even  fall,  but 
these  great  colleges  will   stand,  whether  under  a 


40       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

monarchy  or  in  a  republic  ;  their  foundation  is  sure 
and  their  immortahty  is  certain.  The  founders  of 
such  institutions  of  learning  will  live  in  honored 
memory  while  time  lasts.  Those  who  contribute 
to  the  establishment  and  to  the  endowment  of  in- 
stitutions of  learning  should  have  higher  motives 
than  these.  As  a  rule  they  have  higher  motives  ; 
as  a  rule  the  considerations  named  are  only  sec- 
ondary, if  they  are  present  at  all.  But  they  cer- 
tainly are  not  unworthy  of  mention  on  an  occasion 
of  this  kind.  All  honor  to  the  noble  men  who 
have  given  so  largely  of  their  wealth  ;  all  honor  to 
the  scores  and  hundreds  of  men  and  women  who 
have  given  out  of  their  comparative  poverty  for  the 
founding  of  this  institution.  Their  names  shall 
shine  as  the  stars  forever  in  the  galaxy  of  noble, 
intelligent,   and    consecrated  Canadian  Baptists. 

Permit  me  on  this  occasion  to  call  your  atten- 
tion to  the  "  Characteristics  of  True  Culture,"  as  the 
special  topic  for  remark. 

FIRST    CHARACTERISTIC. 

We  may  say  at  the  outset,  that  true  culture  must 
be  cojnprehensive.  It  is  evident  that  true  culture 
implies  the  development  of  all  the  faculties  of  our 
complex  being.  A  very  little  consideration  will 
make  this  truth  perfectly  clear.  What  is  culture  ? 
Look  at  the  derivation  of  the  word.  It  is  tilling. 
To  till  you  must  plow  or  delve  ;  you  must  rake  or 
harrow.  You  have  culture  in  a  field  only  as  you 
have  tilling.     Parts  of  the  field  that  have  not  been 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF   TRUE   CULTURE  4 1 

tilled  are  not  cultured.  That  cannot  then  be  a 
cultured  field  in  which  large  portions  have  been 
neglected.  New  World  farmers  are  astonished  when 
they  see  the  fields  of  the  Old  World  farmers.  With 
the  latter  every  spot  is  tilled,  every  mountain  side 
is  cultured. 

No  man  can  claim  that  his  is  a  well-tilled  farm 
when  much  of  it  has  never  felt  the  plowshare  or 
the  spade.  So  no  man  can  fairly  claim  the  honors 
of  culture,  portions  of  whose  nature  lie  fallow. 
What  would  you  say  of  a  man  who  would  claim 
to  be  cultured  simply  because  his  muscles  were 
well  developed.  You  say,  "  Yes  ;  he  has  physical 
culture,  let  him  limit  his  claim  to  that."  But  you 
rightly  demand  more.  The  intellect  also  must 
have  culture.  Now  more  of  the  territory  has  been 
gone  over ;  now  more  may  be  rightly  claimed 
by  the  man.  But  why  stop  there  ?  The  man  is 
more  than  muscles  and  mind.  You  must  go 
higher.  All  things  below  man  look  up  to  man  as 
their  center.  Shall  he  have  no  upward  look  ?  All 
faculties  within  look  to  the  heart,  the  soul,  the  con- 
science. 

The  word  conscience  suggests  this  upward  look. 
It  is  a  solemn  word.  It  is  knowing  together  with 
another.  Who  is  that  other?  There  stands  God. 
The  literal  meaning  of  one  Greek  word  for  man 
is  "The  upward-looking  one."  A  man  who  has 
no  upward  look  is  unworthy  of  the  name  ;  he  is 
denying  his  dignity  ;  he  is  stripping  himself  of  his 
glory.      Language  itself  witnesses  for  its  author. 


42       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Man  is  not  a  god  unto  himself.  A  true  culture 
includes  the  entire  field  ;  it  sweeps  across  every 
faculty.  It  has  its  earthward,  its  manward,  and 
its  Godward  relation.  If  lacking  in  any  of  these 
directions  it  is  partial,  defective,  and  unauthoritative 
culture.  It  is  like  Ephraim,  who  is  likened  to  a 
cake  not  turned — a  cake  baked  only  on  one  side. 

Tried  by  this  true  standard  many  claimants  for 
this  honor  will  be  found  wanting.  Sidney  Smith 
thought  it  better  not  to  read  a  book  which  he  was 
to  review — reading  might  prejudice  his  judgment. 
So  do  men  of  culture  in  some  directions  seem  to  act 
in  regard  to  religion  and  the  Bible.  The  religious 
side  of  their  nature  is  neglected,  other  parts  are 
cultivated.  On  science  and  art  they  would  not 
make  ignorance  a  claim  to  authority ;  in  regard  to 
religion  they  act  as  if  their  ignorance  especially 
fitted  them  for  bold  and  authoritative  statement. 
Such  men  would  deserve  our  contempt  did  not  our 
religion  teach  us  to  give  them  our  pity.  The  apos- 
tles could  say,  "We  speak  that  we  do  know"  ;  not 
so  with  these  ill-cultured  critics  of  divine  things. 
Locke  said,  "It  needs  a  sunny  eye  to  see  the  sun." 
He  is  right.  No  man  can  see  the  ocean  except  he 
have  oceans  in  his  soul  ;  no  man  can  truly  enjoy 
the  mountains  unless  he  has  mountains  on  his  brain  ; 
so  no  man  knows  divine  love  save  as  he  has  felt  its 
constraining  power.  Flesh  and  blood  cannot  reveal 
the  deep  things  of  God  to  a  man.  The  Lord's 
secret  is  with  those  who  fear  him. 

To  know  bread  and  meat  you  must  eat  them. 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF    TRUE    CULTURE  43 

A  hungry  man  who  should  coolly  pronounce  on  the 
life-giving  qualities  of  bread  and  meat  as  the  result 
of  a  chemical  analysis  alone  would  proclaim  himself 
a  fool.  You  would  say  of  him  that  much  stamng 
had  made  him  mad.  So  to  be  able  to  judge  of  re- 
ligion you  must  have  religion  ;  you  must  have  the 
bread  of  heaven.  This  is  not  on  the  part  of  the  re- 
ligious teacher  asking  too  much.  If  you  are  to 
demonstrate  to  me  a  problem  in  geometry  you 
have  a  right  to  demand  that  I  shall  know  enough 
of  the  science  at  least  to  follow  you  step  by  step. 
If  I  do  not,  how  dare  I  dissent  from  your  conclu- 
sion? Is  my  ignorance  to  give  me  authority? 
Geometrically  I  am,  on  this  supposition,  an  utterly 
uncultured  man. 

Surely  a  man  ought  to  be  diffident  in  pro- 
nouncing an  opinion  on  a  subject  which  he  has 
never  studied.  Sir  Isaac  Newton  was  right  when 
he  said  to  Dr.  Halley,  a  man  of  science  but  an  un- 
believer in  God's  word  :  "  I  am  glad  to  hear  you 
speak  about  astronomy  and  mathematics,  for  you 
have  studied  and  you  understand  them  ;  but  you 
should  not  talk  of  Christianity,  for  you  have  never 
studied  it."  That  is  good  sense.  Dr.  Halley  was 
not  a  man  of  culture  so  far  as  Christianity  was  con- 
cerned ;  that  side  of  his  nature  was  unbaked,  un- 
cultured. In  recent  discussions  on  the  life  and 
work  of  Emerson,  the  name  of  Thoreau  has  often 
been  mentioned.  He  is  a  type  of  one  class  of  men 
of  culture,  so  called.  In  1837  he  graduated  from 
Harvard  College.    For  three  years  he  was  a  teacher ; 


44       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

he  then  occupied  himself  with  various  kinds  of  me- 
chanical pursuits  and  with  land  surveying.  He 
imbibed  the  spirit  of  Emerson's  transcendentalism. 
In  March,  1845,  he  built  himself  a  shanty  on  the 
shore  of  Walden  Pond.  There  he  lived  a  sort  of 
hermit  life.  One  object  was  to  see  how  simply  and 
cheaply  a  man  could  live  ;  and  he  demonstrated 
that  it  was  possible  to  do  this  on  seventy  dollars  a 
year.  Noble  achievement !  Grand  ambition  !  True, 
he  wrote  a  little.  But  what  did  he  really  accom- 
plish? How  was  he  better  than  the  miserable 
monastic  hermits  of  an  earlier  day?  Such  culture 
is  in  its  last  analysis  supreme  selfishness,  and  sel- 
fishness is  the  essence  of  all  sin. 

Emerson,  in  a  measure,  fell  into  the  same  snare. 
He  was  refined,  solitary,  personally  pure,  and  noble. 
But  whose  sorrows  did  he  share  ?  Whose  burdens 
did  he  lift?  Carlyle's  culture  was  painfully  one- 
sided. He  was  crusted  on  the  one  side,  he  was  crude 
on  the  other.  The  harsh,  the  crabbed,  the  unloving 
elements  were  unduly  developed  ;  the  tender,  gentle, 
and  winning  graces  were  neglected.  He  broke  the 
heart  of  Jane  Welsh,  who  devoted  her  great  powers 
and  sacrificed  her  lofty  ambition  to  be  his  household 
slave.  She  might  have  been  the  wife  of  Edward 
Irving,  and  if  he  had  had  her  for  a  wife  he  would 
have  had  fewer  dreams  and  visions  and  would  have 
accomplished  more  for  God  and  man.  Carlyle  held 
this  woman  almost  exclusively  to  the  drudgery  of 
menial  duties.  If  he  had  given  her  the  position 
which  her  worth  demanded  and  had  helped  her  in 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF    TRUE    CULTURE  45 

her  domestic  burdens,  he  would  have  had  less  dys- 
pepsia in  his  body  and  less  savagery  in  his  books. 
If  a  few  more  lives  of  Carlyle  are  published  we  shall 
begin  to  wish  that  one  life  had  never  been  lived  ; 
the  iconoclast  of  shams,  there  is  danger  that  he 
himself  shall  be  proved  a  sham.  The  men  who 
bless  and  save  the  world  in  the  largest  sense,  are 
not  men  of  Carlyle's  stamp.  His  very  greatness 
makes  his  weakness  the  more  conspicuous. 

It  is  also  to  be  borne  in  mind  that  both  Emerson 
and  Carlyle  seem  to  have  come,  in  their  later  years, 
more  fully  into  the  light  of  Christ  than  in  their 
middle  life.  Remarks  made  by  Emerson  plainly 
show  that  his  pantheism  gave  way  to  theism,  and 
that  Christ  became  more  and  more  an  example  and 
helper.  Carlyle  fully  acknowledged,  as  he  stood 
on  the  brink  of  eternity,  that  the  old  words  learned 
in  childhood  came  back  with  wondrous  power — 
that  the  chief  end  of  man  was  to  glorify  God  and 
enjoy  him  forever.  Culture?  Yes,  but  let  it  be  the 
culture  of  the  whole  man.  Such  was  the  culture  of 
Howard,  of  Wilberforce,  and  of  Lincoln.  Those 
were  men  of  broader  sympathies,  philanthropic  im- 
pulses, and  practical  aims.  All  acknowledge  the 
power  of  George  Eliot  as  a  thinker  and  writer. 
She  was  in  some  respects  the  most  accomplished 
woman  of  her  generation.  A  woman's  pen  stabbed 
to  the  heart  the  monster  slavery  in  America,  and 
George  Eliot's  pen  was  a  mighty  instrument  for 
piercing  many  an  evil  in  England  and  throughout 
the  world.     But  she   had   a  narrow  outlook  and 


46       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

almost  no  uplook.  This  world  bounded  her  range 
of  vision.  She  was  a  preacher  of  despair  and  an 
apostle  of  pessimism.  She  robbed  herself  of  her 
noblest  crown  as  a  child  of  God  and  an  heir  of 
glory. 

Better  the  rounded  life,  symmetrical  culture,  and 
practical  labors  of  Florence  Nightingale.  Born  in 
the  same  year  as  Queen  Victoria,  she  also  is  a  queen. 
Born  in  the  beautiful  city  of  Florence,  she  therefor 
received  her  beautiful  name.  Taking  the  name  of 
Nightingale,  because  of  family  and  property  con- 
siderations, she  has  proved  herself  to  be  truly  a 
nightingale,  singing  songs  of  hope  and  love  in  the 
loneliness  of  grief  and  in  the  darkness  of  the  mid- 
night hour.  She  possessed  even  in  her  infancy 
that  undefined  and  undefinable  something  which 
has  been  called  "the  nurse's  touch."  Beginning 
in  the  humblest  way  by  carrying  warm  food,  gruel, 
and  tea  to  children  of  sick  neighbors ;  going  with 
flannels  and  bandages  to  the  hospitals  to  aid  the 
distressed ;  going  later  in  life  to  Germany  to  per- 
fect herself  for  such  a  noble  ministry  in  a  famous 
school  devoted  to  instruction  in  the  healing  art,  she 
went  from  strength  to  strength,  being  faithful  in 
that  which  was  least,  and  ready  to  enter  the  door 
of  a  wider  opportunity  when,  in  the  providence  of 
God,  it  should  be  open. 

That  opportunity  soon  came.  The  soldiers  of 
Britain  were  found  in  the  Crimean  War  marching  in 
deep  snow  in  boots  without  soles.  They  laid  their 
weary  bodies  down  at  night  in  tents  whose  floors 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF    TRUE    CULTURE  47 

were  wet  with  melted  snow,  and  whose  sides  were 
but  poorly  protected  from  the  driving  storm.  Never 
did  the  soldiers  of  Britain  fight  under  more  disadvan- 
tageous circumstances.  The  letter  of  Dr.  Russell  to 
the  "London  Times,"  describing  these  horrible  con- 
ditions, aroused  all  England  ;  every  heart  was  stirred 
with  pity  and  with  righteous  indignation,  coupled 
with  profound  sorrow.  All  eyes  were  turned  in  the 
direction  of  some  practical  helper.  Then  up  rose 
Florence  Nightingale.  She  went.  The  world 
knows  her  history ;  the  world  will  never  forget  her 
deeds  of  heroism  and  of  noble  consecration. 
Thousands  of  soldiers  soon  called  her  blessed,  and 
her  name  soon  took  the  place  among  the  noblest 
women  of  the  noblest  nations  of  the  earth.  When 
in  the  American  Republic  the  fiercest  civil  war 
of  the  world  was  raging,  the  example  of  Flor- 
ence Nightingale  aroused  her  American  sisters 
all  over  the  loyal  North,  and  on  scores  of  battle- 
fields and  in  scores  of  hospitals  these  loyal  women 
ministered  to  the  sick  and  soothed  the  pillows 
of  the  dying.  The  American  Nightingales  made 
the  dark  night  of  many  a  terrible  scene  musical 
with  the  song  of  hope,  of  love,  and  of  patriotic 
devotion. 

There  is  more  power  in  the  sweet  and  blessed  life 
of  "Sister  Dora,"  with  her  strong  body,  her  clear 
head,  and  her  consecrated  heart,  ministering  to  the 
sick,  instructing  the  well,  and  caring  for  the  dying, 
than  in  the  lives  of  all  the  sentimental  hermits,  tran- 
scendental philosophers,  and  snarling  critics.     It  is 


48       CURRENT   QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

a  touching  and  beautiful  fact  that  almost  at  this 
moment  a  monument  is  being  unveiled  to  the  mem- 
ory of  Sister  Dora,  and  Florence  Nightingale  is 
invited  to  participate  in  the  ceremonies.  The 
beautiful  letter  which  she  has  written  in  reply  to 
the  invitation  is  now  being  read  in  the  newspapers 
of  two  continents,  and  the  memoirs  of  these  two 
women  will  hereafter  be  united  by  the  tenderest  of 
sisterly  ties.  Give  us  this  stalwart  sister  Dora ! 
Give  us  the  fragile  and  fragrant  Havergal,  whose 
songs,  inspired  by  genius  and  Christian  consecra- 
tion, will  be  sung  for  many  generations  as  samples 
of  the  culture  which  the  world  needs  and  which 
only  the  spirit  of  Christ  and  his  cross  can  give  ! 
True  culture  develops  all  the  faculties  of  the  soul. 
True  culture  must  be  comprehensive  also,  cover- 
ing a  very  broad  field.  Not  only  all  the  faculties 
of  the  soul  are  to  be  developed,  but  true  scholar- 
ship must  include  a  very  wide  range  of  subjects  in 
our  day.  Every  man  who  is  made  is,  in  a  true 
sense,  self-made.  The  term  scholar,  unfortunately, 
is  not  eynonymous  with  the  term  college  graduate.^ 
There  are  scholars  who  are  not  college  graduates  ; 
there  are  college  graduates  who  are  not  scholars. 
Some  graduates  have  not  the  habits,  tastes,  and  in- 
stincts of  scholars.  It  is  not  the  business  of  a 
college  to  furnish  brains.  A  college  is  a  mill,  and 
the  character  of  the  flour  depends  upon  the  qual- 

^  At  this  point  a  few  of  the  thoughts  expressed  in  the  first  paper 
are  repeated.  They  are  retained  because  of  their  importance  in 
their  present  connection. — [Ed.] 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF   TRUE    CULTURE  49 

ity  of  the  grain  which  goes  into  the  hopper.  No 
college  faculty  can  get  something  out  of  nothing. 
You  can  polish  maple  or  marble ;  you  cannot 
polish  cheese  or  chalk.  It  has  been  often  and  con- 
clusively demonstrated  that  money  cannot  pur- 
chase capacity.  The  fool  brayed  in  the  college 
mortar,  with  however  good  a  presidential  pestle,  is 
a  fool  still.  Doubtless  he  will  profit  by  the  bray- 
ing ;  doubtless  some  of  his  foolishness  will  have 
departed  from  him  by  the  time  of  his  graduation. 
If  after  the  advantages  of  the  college  course  there 
is  so  great  stupidity  as  we  sometimes  see,  how  great 
would  that  stupidity  be  had  there  been  no  college 
course?  The  stupidity  is  in  spite  of,  not  because 
of,  the  training  received.  On  the  other  hand, 
those  who  are  scholars  but  not  college  graduates, 
are  such  in  spite  of  their  disadvantages.  Given  a 
college  training  and  how  much  more  complete, 
symmetrical,  and  polished  their  scholarship  would 
be.  The  colleges  simply  help  men  to  make  them- 
selves. The  college  training  sharpens  nature's 
tools  and  teaches  their  right  use.  You  may  with 
one  hand  hold  on  the  grindstone  a  chisel  with  which 
you  are  to  carve  out  fame  and  fortune ;  you  may 
turn  the  stone  with  the  other  hand,  but  if  you 
could  hold  the  chisel  with  both  hands  while  the 
college  faculty  turned  the  stone,  your  chances  for  a 
fine-edged  tool  would  be  wonderfully  improved. 

This  broad  scholarship  is  needed  to-day,  not 
alone  in  professional  and  political,  but  also  in  busi- 
ness life.     The  relations  of  business  life  are  more 

D 


50       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

far-reaching  to-day  than  ever  before  in  the  world's 
history.  The  world  is  both  larger  and  smaller  than 
ever  before — larger  in  regard  to  its  points  of  con- 
tact with  our  daily  lives — smaller  in  regard  to  the 
facility  with  which  the  contact  is  make.  Mr.  Joseph 
Cook  has  said  that  there  are  now  no  hermit  nations. 
Inspired  by  a  unifying  and  sympathetic  impulse  the 
nations  have  risen  above  their  former  boundaries, 
and  have  mingled  the  results  of  their  labor  in  one 
great  ocean  of  national  life  and  Christian  endeavor. 
Steamships  and  railways  make  distant  continents 
near  neighbors  ;  telegraphs  and  telephones  have 
made  the  world  a  whispering  gallery.  They  have 
changed  the  business  and  the  civilization  of  the 
century.  They  represent  on  a  gigantic  scale  the 
marvels  of  each  man's  own  nervous  system. 

With  bowed  head  and  palpitating  heart,  all  Chris- 
tendom, a  few  years  ago,  virtually  stood  by  the  bed- 
side of  General  Garfield  while  he  was  fighting  his 
terrible  battle.  In  the  capitals  of  the  world  his  pulse- 
beats  were  counted  ;  princes  and  peasants  listened 
with  mingled  hope  and  fear  for  his  heart-throbs. 
Since  that  day  all  the  world  watched  General  Grant 
fighting  the  only  enemy  he  could  not  conquer. 
Such  kinship  was  impossible  a  generation  ago ; 
such  unity  of  knowledge  and  interest  will  do  much 
to  unite  the  world  in  the  bonds  of  perpetual  broth- 
erhood. Every  morning  the  ends  of  the  world  meet 
in  the  paper  at  our  breakfast  table.  In  this  day 
merchants  deal  with  peoples  of  various  names, 
colors,  languages,  and  conditions.     Soon  the  Congo 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF    TRUE    CULTURE  5  I 

Valley  will  be  as  familiar  to  our  thought  and  speech 
as  is  the  valley  of  the  Mississippi  to-day.  Already 
goods  are  shipped  from  our  ports  to  the  corners 
of  the  earth  ;  already  new  branches  of  manufac- 
tures are  preparing  to  enter  these  new  and  vast 
fields  of  commercial  enterprise.  India  is  as  near 
us  to-day  as  Liverpool  was  a  generation  ago.  To- 
day the  merchant  and  the  manufacturer  ought  to 
know  the  history,  the  products,  the  needs,  the 
habits  and  the  conditions  of  at  least  half  a  dozen 
nations.  To-day  in  the  city  of  New  York  repre- 
sentatives of  almost  every  nation  under  heaven  may 
be  met  upon  the  street,  and  forty  different  lan- 
guages and  dialects  are  heard  in  a  morning's  walk. 
The  same  thing  is  true  of  London.  The  successful 
man  of  the  past  generation,  if  he  should  still  -follow 
the  old  methods,  would  be  a  helpless  dwarf  amid 
the  tremendous  giants  of  to-day. 

Do  you  tell  me  that  the  business  man  of  to-day 
does  not  need  scholarship  both  vast  and  varied? 
Then  I  ask  you,  "Where  have  you  lived?  In  what 
sunless  hole  have  you  burrowed,  that  you  cherish 
such  an  opinion?"  Our  most  kingly  merchants, 
not  to  speak  of  professional  men,  find  an  ever- widen- 
ing sphere  for  the  employment  of  all  their  faculties 
in  the  tremendous  rush  and  roar  of  the  world-em- 
bracing possibilities  of  our  time,  in  the  march  of 
trade,  and  in  the  general  diffusion  of  knowledge  in 
our  day.  Never  was  it  more  evident  than  at  this 
hour  that  any  scholarship,  worthy  of  the  name,  must 
be  comprehensive  in  the  sense  in  which  I  am  now 


52       CURRENT    QUESTJONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

using  that  term.  No  man  may  rightly  lay  claim  to 
the  honors  of  culture  who  does  not  cover  a  very 
wide  and  varied  field  in  the  use  of  his  intellectual 
plow  and  harrow. 

But  scholarship  must  also  be  comprehensive  in 
the  sense  of  making  a  thorough  examination  of  any 
particular  topic.  The  time  was  when  specialists 
were  synonymous  with  quacks — when  in  the  pro- 
fession of  medicine  to  speak  of  an  oculist  or  an 
aurist,  or  of  a  man  devoted  to  any  one  branch  of 
medical  practice,  was  confessedly  or  tacitly  to  speak 
of  him  as  a  charlatan,  an  empiric,  a  quack.  That 
day  is  now  past.  Specialists  are  recognized  with 
peculiar  regard,  and  their  opinions  received  with 
marked  authority  in  their  various  professions.  The 
field  of  inquiry  is  too  large  to  be  thoroughly  can- 
vassed by  any  one  man,  however  vast  and  varied 
his  erudition  may  be.  However  much  we  enlarge 
the  boundaries  of  the  known,  we  by  so  much,  and 
by  much  more,  enlarge  the  boundaries  of  the  un- 
known. Every  new  discovery  suggests  a  thousand 
truths  not  yet  fully  discovered  ;  every  new  acquire- 
ment impresses  the  student  with  the  meagreness  of 
his  attainments,  the  paucity  of  his  knowledge,  and 
the  blindness  of  his  intellectual  eyesight. 

No  man  can  know  everything  about  everything. 
It  is  often  a  confession,  not  of  ignorance,  but  of  right 
knowledge  and  good  common  sense  when  a  man 
says,  "  I  do  not  know  ;  on  that  subject  I  am  igno- 
rant." The  first  step  is  taken  in  the  direction  of 
wide  attainment  when  a  man  is  distinctly  conscious 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF    TRUE    CULTURE  53 

of  his  own  ignorance.  To  draw  the  hne  then,  be- 
tween broad  knowledge  and  special  attainment  is 
no  easy  matter.  The  true  rule,  perhaps,  is  that  a 
man  should  know  something  of  everything  and 
everything  of  something.  The  farmer  should  be  a 
chemist  as  far  as  a  knowledge  of  soils  and  seeds 
and  climates  is  concerned.  So  ought  every  me- 
chanic and  every  professional  man  to  be  master  of 
the  special  department  of  knowledge  to  which  he 
devotes  himself  Let  me  urge  you  to  be  thorough  ; 
to  be  able  to  speak  with  authority  upon  all  the 
factors  which  enter  into  the  problems  with  which 
your  own  life  is  specially  concerned.  In  these 
three  directions  then,  we  earnestly  urge  that 
scholarship  shall  be  comprehensive ;  it  must  include 
all  the  faculties  of  the  soul,  it  must  cover  a  wide 
range  of  topics,  and  it  must  master  all  the  facts  of 
some  one  topic  in  order  that  it  may  claim  the  credit 
of  comprehensiveness. 

SECOND  CHARACTERISTIC. 

But  let  me  remark,  in  the  second  place,  that 
true  culture  must  manifest  itself  in  noble  character. 
Culture  is  not  an  end  in  itself;  it  is  the  means  to 
an  end.  That  end  is  noble  character.  What  is 
character?  As  the  word  implies,  it  is  the  man's 
distinctive  mark.  Reputation  is  what  a  man  seems 
to  be  ;  character  is  what  a  man  is.  Reputation  is 
what  men  think  we  are  ;  character  what  God  knows 
us  to  be.  Reputation  is  seeming ;  character  is 
being.     There  are  circumstances  under  which  men 


54       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

of  good  character  may  have  a  bad  reputation  ;  there 
are  cases  also  when  men  of  good  reputation  may 
possess  a  bad  character.  Sometimes  to  be  thought 
ill  of  by  some  people  is  the  highest  compliment ; 
you  would  be  degraded  if  they  thought  well  of 
you.  But  seeming  and  being  cannot  long  contra- 
dict each  other  ;  no  man  can  long  play  the  hypo- 
crite. The  being  will  soon  give  color  to  the  seem- 
ing. What  a  man  is  in  the  sight  of  God,  he  will 
soon  appear  to  be  even  in  the  sight  of  man.  What 
is  in  the  man  must  come  out.  No  man  falls  sud- 
denly. There  is  a  sudden  crash  and  the  world  is 
startled,  but  the  man  long  leaned  before  he  fell. 
The  man's  sin  was  long  seen  by  God  before  the 
world  discovered  his  character. 

To-day  character  of  high  order  is  in  constant 
demand.  Whatever  will  tend  to  its  cultivation 
is  worthy  of  our  earnest  thought  and  continued 
endeavor.  We  are  startled  by  the  number  of 
defalcations  w'hose  accounts  fill  the  newspapers. 
Defaulters  are  found  in  high  places,  as  well  as  in 
low  ;  they  are  found  in  the  church  as  well  as  in  the 
world.  Defaulters  are  multiplying  so  rapidly  that 
men  sometimes  ask,  "  Can  honesty  be  found  any- 
where ?  "  But  let  us  not  give  way  to  pessimism  of 
this  sort.  The  world  is  not  growing  worse.  The 
church  was  never  more  intelligent,  benevolent,  and 
consecrated  than  it  is  to-day.  For  every  man  who 
is  a  defaulter  there  are  scores  and  hundreds  and 
thousands  who  stand  firm  as  a  rock  amid  the 
strongest  temptations.      Men  by  the  thousand  can 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF    TRUE    CULTURE  55 

readily  be  found  in  banks,  in  offices,  and  in  other 
positions  of  trust,  who  would  rather  die  than  betray 
any  trust.  You  in  Canada  harbor  some  American 
merchants,  aldermen,  and  others,  who  find  it  nec- 
essary for  their  convenience  and  comfort  to  live 
across  the  border ;  but  we  have  millions  who  do 
not  come,  except  now  and  then  you  invite  some  of 
them  ;  and  they  go  back  whenever  they  choose 
without  the  company  of  a  sheriff's  officer.  While 
you  are  thinking  of  one  defaulter,  do  not  forget  the 
thousands  of  true  and  honest  men  who  would 
rather  be  shot  than  defraud  God  or  man. 

Perhaps  we  have  made  too  much  of  the  devil.  We 
owe  him  nothing  but  disrespect,  contempt,  and  dis- 
obedience. But  there  is  enough  in  the  dishonesty 
practised  to  suggest  earnest  inquiry  and  to  lead  to 
earnest  effort  to  secure  character  of  a  high  order. 
Such  character  is  wanted  to-day  as  never  before. 
Every  man  in  God's  world  will,  in  the  course  of  time, 
get  all  that  he  is  worth.  We  have  no  sympathy  with 
men  who  complain  that  they  are  not  appreciated. 
There  is  no  corner  in  the  universe  sufficiently  ob- 
scure to  hide  a  man  of  power ;  God  wants  such 
men  ;  the  world  wants  such  men.  The  world  seeks 
them  ;  God  sends  for  them.  They  find  their  level ; 
some  far  above  the  position  of  the  average  man. 
God  has  a  hook,  in  a  different  sense  from  that  in 
which  he  had  it  in  the  nose  of  Sennacherib,  in  the 
nose  of  every  man.  God  reaches  out  his  hand 
after  such  men  and  says,  "  Come  up  higher,"  and 
they    go.      Now,    culture,     education,    scholarship 


56       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

which  does  not  develop  character  of  the  highest 
order,  is  not  culture,  education,  scholarship  of  the 
highest  order.  We  want  the  ripest  products  which 
all  these  influences  can  possibly  produce. 

We  must  remember  that  character  of  the  highest 
order  is  not  formed  amid  the  rush  of  the  street.  The 
whole  trend  of  college  and  church  effort  to-day  is 
apt  to  be  too  much  in  the  direction  of  work.  The 
cry  at  our  religious  and  educational  conventions  is, 
Work,  work,  work.  The  song  we  constantly  hear 
is,  "Work,  for  the  night  is  coming"  ;  the  text  we 
frequently  quote  is,  "A  workman  that  needeth  not 
to  be  ashamed";  the  command  which  we  con- 
stantly utter  is,  "Son,  go  work  in  my  vineyard." 
We  love  to  represent  our  Christian  life  as  a  battle- 
field and  the  Christian  as  a  soldier.  There  is  truth 
in  this  representation  ;  there  is  in  it  a  truth  we  must 
never  forget ;  a  truth,  on  the  contrary,  which  we 
must  often  and  emphatically  urge.  Nevertheless 
this  is  not  the  whole  truth.  In  the  word  of  God 
we  find  constant  reference  to  walking,  growing, 
fruit-bearing.  Amid  the  hurry  and  bustle  of  the 
present  day  we  do  not  give  sufficient  time  to  the 
building  of  the  noblest  forms  of  character.  Every 
life  must  have  its  time  of  secret  communion  with 
God,  when  it  may  receive  in  secret  that  which  it 
shall  bestow  in  public.  Christ's  life  was  spent 
partly  in  the  closet  and  partly  in  the  crowd  ;  partly 
in  communion  with  God  and  partly  in  labor  for  man. 
He  swept  into  the  hemisphere  of  communion  with 
God,  receiving  the  Spirit  without  measure  ;  and  he 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF    TRUE    CULTURE  57 

then  swept  into  the  hemisphere  of  active  work, 
bestowing  upon  man  blessings  without  measure. 
In  proportion  as  we  Hve  over  again  Christ's  Hfe 
in  this,  as  in  all  respects,  we  shall  attain  to  the 
highest  Christian  possibilities,  we  shall  develop  the 
most  symmetrical  character.  The  physical  life  re- 
quires relaxation  that  it  may  enjoy  wholesome 
exercise  ;  not  less  does  the  spiritual  life  require 
profound  meditation  and  careful  and  consecrated 
Bible  study.  Like  Martha  many  are  cumbered 
with  much  serving ;  we  do  not  object  to  the  much 
serving,  but  like  Mary  we  must  find  time  also 
to  sit  at  the  Master's  feet.  Sitting  there  we  re- 
ceive strength  to  run  in  the  way  of  Christ's  com- 
mandments. Hearing  his  word,  we  learn  best 
how  to  speak  with  wisdom  to  men.  Christian  char- 
acter is  to  be  exalted  by  combining  wholesome  ac- 
tivity with  reposeful  contemplation. 

THE    THIRD    CHARACTERISTIC. 

The  third  characteristic  of  true  culture  which  I 
shall  name  is  that  it  is  Christian.  The  highest  form 
of  character  is  not  possible  except  it  shall  be  re- 
lated to  Jesus  Christ.  We  are  thus  led  from  cul- 
ture to  character  and  from  character  to  Christ. 
True  culture  must  be  Christian.  It  ought  to  be 
known  that  in  a  true  sense  knowledge,  not  ignor- 
ance, is  the  mother  of  devotion.  The  infinitely 
great  on  the  one  hand  and  the  infinitely  small  on 
the  other  invite  us  to  their  study  and  charm  us  by 
their  mystery.     Christianity  welcomes  investigation. 


58       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Her  spirit  builds  our  free  schools  and  endows  our 
colleges  and  seminaries.  Christian  young  men 
ought  to  surpass  all  others  in  the  extent  and  char- 
acter of  their  attainments.  They  have  Christ  for 
their  teacher,  and  the  noblest  men  and  purest 
women  the  world  has  ever  known,  for  their  fellow- 
pupils.  Culture  has  ever  adorned  Christianity  with 
its  beauty,  and  Christianity  in  its  turn  has  crowned 
culture  with  its  unfading  glories.  Learning  has 
often  found  its  noblest  employment  in  casting  its 
treasures,  like  the  wise  men  from  the  East,  at  the 
feet  of  Jesus.  Christ  must  be  placed  in  the  very 
center  of  the  intellectual  life,  if  its  highest  possibil- 
ities are  to  be  realized.  All  intellectual  activity 
must  go  out  from  him  as  light  rays  from  the  sun. 
When  he  is  so  enthroned  truths  will  adjust  them- 
selves to  one  another  in  their  proper  relations. 

The  pure  white  light  of  intellect  is  impossible 
except  it  kindles  its  torch  at  the  cross  of  Christ.  The 
highest  glory  of  Greek  and  Latin  literature  was  a  re- 
flection from  the  divine  splendor  which  rested  on 
Hebrew  altars.  Nothing  has  in  it  the  element  of  en- 
durance except  it  be  religious.  The  Greek  poems 
and  dramas  are  no  exceptions  to  this  law.  They 
were  religious  ;  in  some  important  respects  they 
voiced  the  deepest  religious  feelings  and  the  loftiest 
aspirations  of  the  best  men  of  their  time.  The  oper- 
ettas of  the  day  are  only  for  the  day.  Enduring 
music  is  religious.  The  loftiest  human  aspirations 
are  divine  aspirations.  The  men  who  most  trium- 
phantly walk  the  dizzy  heights  of  intellectual  great- 


CHARACTERISTICS    OF    TRUE    CULTURE         '    59 

ness  are  those  who  most  humbly  walk  with  God. 
The  most  loyal  disciple  in  Christ's  school,  other 
things  being  equal,  should  be  the  most  successful 
disciple  in  all  other  schools.  Christ  is  the  truth  ; 
in  its  vast  realms  he  is  King.  All  truth  worships 
at  his  pierced  feet.  This  thought  gives  dignity  to 
intellectual  pursuits.  All  angles  and  triangles,  sines 
and  cosines,  thus  become  revelations  of  the  thoughts 
of  God.  Geometry  becomes  voiceful  with  eternal 
truths,  and  astronomy  declares  the  glory  of  God  in 
the  firmament  which  showeth  his  handiwork.  All 
history  is  but  an  unfolding  of  his  divine  plan  and 
eternal  purpose.  The  undevout  student  is  un- 
scientific. How  can  he  master  the  great  truths  of 
science  and  history  if  he  be  disloyal  to  the  King  of 
Truth  ?  To  know  them  aright  he  must  first  know 
him  aright.  As  well  might  a  man  write  a  treatise 
on  astronomy  and  leave  out  the  sun  as  to  attempt 
to  write  a  history  of  this  world  and  leave  out  Jesus 
Christ,  the  Sun  of  Righteousness. 

These  truths  are  illustrated  in  history.  It  has 
dawned  upon  the  thinkers  of  to-day  that  there  is  a 
philosophy,  a  science  of  history  ;  that  there  is  his- 
toric continuity  in  the  story  of  races  and  events  ; 
that  they  are  not  unrelated  facts  ;  that  behind  all 
things  is  the  mind  of  God  ;  that  controlling  all 
things  is  the  hand  of  God.  Current  events  cannot 
be  understood  except  as  we  see  in  them  the  stately 
steppings  of  the  Lord's  Christ.  Gladstone  knows 
this.  In  the  government  or  out  of  it,  he  is  the  fore- 
most man  in  the  world  to-day  ;  and  he  is  as  humble 


6o       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

a  Christian  as  he  is  learned  as  a  scholar  or  great  as 
a  statesman.  The  truly  great  scholars  of  the  world 
to-day  are  pupils  in  Christ's  school.  Not  Gibbon, 
not  Hume,  notMacaulay,  not  Greene,  not  McMaster, 
can  write  history  and  leave  out  Christ.  The  reverent 
student  of  history  hears  the  echoes  of  his  footbeats 
all  down  the  corridors  of  the  centuries.  He  sees 
all  historic  forces  before  the  coming  of  Christ  con- 
verging toward  the  cross  ;  he  sees  all  after  his  com- 
ing diverging  fiom  it.  The  cross  is  the  pivotal 
point  of  the  world's  history.  It  stood  at  the  con- 
fluence of  three  streams  of  civilization  :  Hebrew, 
the  language  of  religion  ;  Greek,  the  language  of 
culture  ;  Latin,  the  language  of  law.  To  under- 
stand these  forces  in  the  world's  life,  you  must  sit 
beneath  the  cross  of  Calvary.  Perhaps  Hugh  Mil- 
ler did  not  go  too  far  when  he  claimed  to  have 
found  the  cross  in  the  hoary  rocks.  It  is  certain 
that  the  true  historical  student  sees  the  hand  of 
Christ  on  the  helm  of  the  universe.  All  science, 
all  history,  all  true  intellectual  effort  receives  from 
Christ  its  inspiration  and  lays  at  his  feet  its  noblest 
achievements. 

The  same  truth  is  seen  in  literature.  Many  per- 
sons are  ambitious  to  be  considered  great  readers, 
and  they  too  often  neglect  the  Bible.  It  is  im- 
possible to  read  all  the  books  published  by  the 
prolific  press  of  the  day.  It  is  as  undesirable  as  it 
is  impossible.  As  well  might  you  submit  to  hav- 
ing every  man  you  meet  on  the  street  to-morrow 
morning  take  you  by  the  button-hole,  as  have  every 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF   TRUE   CULTURE  6 1 

book  published  arrest  your  attention.  There  are, 
however,  certain  classics  that  every  well-informed 
man  should  read.  Works  of  history,  science,  art, 
and  some  works  of  fiction  there  are  which  he  should 
read,  but  not  to  the  neglect  of  the  word  of  God. 
In  it  are  Hid  all  the  treasures  of  wisdom  and  knowl- 
edge. 

Many  illustrations  emphasize  these  statements. 
When  Sir  Walter  Scott  lay  dying,  he  was  carried 
into  his  dining  room  that  he  might  gaze  on  the 
beautiful  Tweed,  which  he  so  much  loved.  He 
then  asked  his  son-in-law,  Mr.  Lockhart,  to  read 
to  him.  "What  book?"  asked  Mr.  Lockhart. 
"  What  book  ?  "said  Sir  Walter  ;  "  there  is  but  one, 
the  Bible,  read  that."  He  who  had  read  so  widely, 
and  had  contributed  so  many  immortal  pages  to 
literature,  gives  this  testimony  to  the  value  of  the 
Bible.  Mr.  Dickens  was  in  the  habit  of  writing  a 
letter  to  each  of  his  sons  as  he  left  the  paternal 
roof  In  one  he  urged  his  son,  whatever  other 
books  be  neglected,  to  read  the  Bible,  as  it  con- 
tained the  purest  morality  and  the  best  known  rules 
of  life  in  the  world.  When  Milton  would  become 
a  "  poet,  soaring  in  the  high  reason  of  his  fancies, 
with  his  garland  and  singing  robes  about  him,"  he 
must  go  to  the  Bible  for  his  high  theme.  The 
music  of  "  Siloa's  brook  that  flowed  fast  by  the 
oracle  of  God,"  gives  its  charm  to  his  lofty  verse. 

The  debt  which  music,  painting,  sculpture,  and 
literature  owe  to  the  Bible  cannot  be  fully  estimated. 
It  has  been  said  by  a  competent  authority  that  the 


62       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Red  Cross  Knight,  in  Spenser's  "Faerie  Queene," 
is  but  Paul's  armed  Christian  in  the  sixth  chapter 
of  the  Epistle  to  the  Ephesians  ;  that  Pope's  "  Mes- 
siah "  is  but  a  paraphrase  of  prophetic  and  seraphic 
passages  in  Isaiah ;  that  the  noblest  strains  in 
Cowper's  "Task"  draw  their  inspiration  and  part 
of  their  imagery  from  the  same  rapt  prophet ;  that 
the  "  Thanatopsis  "  of  Bryant  is  but  the  expansion 
of  a  passage  in  Job  ;  that  Wordsworth's  "  Ode  on 
Immortality"  could  never  have  been  written  but 
for  Paul's  fifteenth  chapter  of  First  Corinthians  and 
the  eighth  chapter  of  Romans  ;  that  Shakespeare's 
conception  of  woman,  of  a  Desdemona  and  of  an 
Ophelia,  would  have  been  impossible  had  not  his 
mind  been  permeated  by  a  Bible,  a  Christian  ideal. 
That  true  culture  must  be  Christian  is  illustrated 
in  art  as  in  literature.  When  Raphael,  "  the  di- 
vine," would  perpetuate  his  name  to  unborn  genera- 
tions, he  must  ascend  the  "holy  mount,"  stand  in 
the  supernal  glory,  and  gaze  on  the  transfigured 
Christ.  As  "  The  Transfiguration  "  was  his  greatest, 
so  it  was  his  last  work.  He  died  at  Rome  on 
April  6th,  1 5  20,  the  anniversary  of  his  birthday,  in 
early  manhood,  being  but  thirty-seven  years  old, 
with  the  "Transfiguration"  on  his  heart  and  brain. 
That  picture  was  carried  before  him  to  his  grave. 
He  was  buried  in  the  Pantheon.  Over  his  sleeping 
dust  some  loving  hands  long  continued  to  place  a 
rose.  This  rose  faded,  but  the  "  Rose  of  Sharon  " 
still  fills  the  world  with  its  perfume.  When  Handel 
was  discouraged  by  attempting  to  give  opera  in  a 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF   TRUE    CULTURE  63 

foreign  language,  he  accepted  an  invitation  from 
several  notables  in  Ireland  to  visit  Dublin,  From 
a  friend  he  received  a  text  from  the  Bible,  and  on 
that  text  he  composed  his  immortal  work,  known 
at  first  as  the  "Sacred  Oratorio,"  now  known  as 
the  "  Messiah."  Both  in  Dublin  and  in  London 
this  work  gave  him  immediate  fame,  and  since, 
throughout  the  world,  it  has  crowned  him  with 
triumphant  success  and  unfading  glories. 

With  undaunted  heart  we  stand  beside  the  Cross 
to-day.  In  this  sign  we  shall  conquer  the  world. 
An  uplifted  Christ  is  still  the  mightiest  magnet  to 
attract  the  hearts  of  men  ;  this  cannot  be  denied. 
That  Cross  is  still  the  power  and  the  wisdom  of 
God.  Some  men  may  affirm  that  the  old  gospel  is 
losing  its  power;  that  "modern  thought"  demands 
a  modern  gospel.  They  have  denied  that  the 
gospel  is  a  finality ;  they  have  invented  other 
gospels.  But  what  is  new  in  them  is  not  true  ; 
and  what  is  true  is  not  new.  They  have  tried 
spiritualism,  and  it  has  proved  itself  to  be  a  vulgar 
cheat  and  contemptible  fraud.  They  have  tried 
materialism,  and  it  has  proved  itself  to  be,  what 
Carlyle  called  it,  "a  gospel  of  dirt."  They  have 
tried  various  shades  of  liberalism,  but  negatives  are 
poor  food  for  hungry  souls.  They  have  tried  sci- 
ence. To  a  true  science  religion  has  no  objections 
to  urge.  What  God  says  in  his  works  must  agree 
with  what  he  says  in  his  word.  Genesis  and  geol- 
ogy, when  each  is  rightly  interpreted,  must  har- 
monize.    A  true  science  will  lay  its  crown  at  Jesus' 


64       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 


feet.  Men  have  tried  atheism.  They  would  de- 
throne God,  they  would  degrade  men  ;  but  God 
refuses  to  be  pushed  out  of  the  world  which  he  has 
made. 

One  scarcely  knows  whether  most  to  pity  or 
despise  these  false  teachers.  They  certainly  ex- 
cite our  pity  ;  they  almost  justify  our  contempt. 
They  are  moles  and  bats  in  the  gleaming  light  of 
the  nineteenth  centurj'.  Once  Paine  boasted,  in 
the  Broadway  Hotel,  in  New  York,  that  in  five 
years  there  would  not  be  a  Bible  in  America.  How 
we  smile  at  his  folly !  The  day  will  come  when  the 
defiant  predictions  of  another  blatant  and  blas- 
phemous infidel  will  excite  our  corresponding  pity 
and  contempt.  The  pulpit  losing  its  power !  The 
Bible  becoming  obsolete  !  The  pulpit  was  never 
so  mighty  a  power  as  it  is  at  this  hour.  The  Bible 
is  mightier  than  ever  before,  while  the  books  of  in- 
fidel opposers  lie  dust-covered  in  unused  libraries. 
I  tell  you  that  as  a  Christian  man  I  walk  with  my 
head  among  the  stars.  The  highest  point  of  human 
greatness  men  ever  reach  is  when  they  bow  at  the 
feet  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  take  him  for  their  Lord 
and  God.  Away  with  the  devil's  nostrums !  I 
respectfully  decline  to  be  orphaned  in  my  Father's 
world.  We  want  the  old,  old  gospel,  old  as  eter- 
nity, and  new  as  the  last  sunbeam  which  has  kissed 
your  cheek.  Nothing  but  the  bread  of  heaven  can 
feed  the  hungry  soul.  Nothing  but  the  balm  of 
Gilead  can  heal  the  heart's  sorrow.  Blessed  be 
God,  his  gospel  will  never  lose  its  power  until  Satan 


CHARACTERISTICS   OF   TRUE    CULTURE  65 

is  crushed'  beneath  our  feet,  and  Christ  is  wor- 
shiped as  Lord  of  all. 

On  the  banks  of  that  river  which  Byron  called 
"the  wide  and  winding  Rhine"  stands  the  old  city 
of  Cologne.  It  is  famous  for  many  things,  but 
especially  for  its  cathedral.  The  old  foundation 
of  this  was  laid  in  814;  the  foundations  of  the 
present  structure  in  1270.  This  cathedral  is  one 
of  the  noblest  specimens  of  Gothic  architecture  in 
the  world.  It  is  five  hundred  and  ten  feet  long 
and  two  hundred  and  thirty  feet  wide.  For  hun- 
dreds of  years  a  great  iron  derrick  hung  from  its 
unfinished  towers.  The  architect  died,  leaving  the 
cathedral  but  a  dream  of  his  brain.  The  pave- 
ments of  this  unfinished  structure  were  dyed  with 
blood  of  friend  and  foe,  but  the  work  was  not  to 
remain  incomplete.  Emperors  laid  hold  of  this 
unfinished  structure  ;  money  was  poured  out  like 
water,  and  that  which  was  once  a  dream  in  the 
architect's  brain  is  now  a  poem  in  stone.  Within 
the  past  few  years  the  work  has  been  completed, 
and  the  highest  work  of  man  beneath  the  stars  at 
this  present  time  is  the  lofty  towers  of  the  cathedral 
of  Cologne.  The  plan  of  the  architect  is  realized 
in  every  detail.  He  died,  but  his  work  lives.  The 
dream  of  his  brain  is  now  a  sermon,  an  inspiration, 
a  poem. 

All  these  glorious  truths  are  illustrated  in  the 
history  of  this  institution.  Perish  the  thought  that 
it  should  live  to  discrown  and  dethrone  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ !     This  day  marks  an  era  in  its  history 

£ 


66       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and  in  the  history  of  Baptist  education  in  the  Do- 
minion of  Canada.  We  have  laid  the  corner-stone 
in  the  name  and  to  the  glory  of  the  Triune  God. 
An  inspiring  future  awaits  us.  Every  science 
and  every  art  shall  bring  its  crown  and  lay  it  here, 
at  the  pierced  feet  of  Christ.  We  are  rearing  a 
nobler  structure  than  one  of  wood  and  stone.  We 
are  building  up  characters  that  shall  be  more  en- 
during than  bronze  or  marble.  We  are  building  in 
individual  lives  a  temple  for  the  King  of  Kings. 
The  workers  will  die  ;  the  work  will  live.  In  it 
Dr.  Fyfe  and  his  companions  in  toil  will  live  over 
again  their  consecrated  lives.  The  foundation  is 
laid  in  Christ's  name,  and  amid  the  shouts  of  saints 
and  the  pseans  of  seraphs  the  capstone  shall  be  laid  ; 
and  our  song  now  and  in  that  glorious  future  shall 
be,  "  Not  unto  us,  not  unto  us,  but  unto  thy  great 
name  be  the  glory." 


Ill 


CHRISTIANITY   AND    THE    SECULAR 
SPIRIT^ 

CHRISTIANITY  is  a  more  pervasive,  domi- 
nant, and  beneficent  force  than  either  its 
friends  or  its  foes  ordinarily  appreciate.  Like 
many  other  mighty  forces  it  works  largely  in 
silence.  It  does  not  give  out  a  loud  report  when 
it  undermines  some  hoary  error  or  establishes  some 
benignant  truth.  God's  great  heavens  and  his  vast 
laboratory  in  the  earth  give  forth,  for  the  most 
part,  no  sound  in  their  gigantic  movements.  God's 
greatest  works  are  performed  in  silent  realms. 
Christianity  is  no  exception  to  this  law.  Like  its 
Founder  it  comes  not  with  observation.  Heathen 
thinkers  and  writers  of  the  early  centuries  of  Chris- 
tianity were  strangely  ignorant  of  its  power,  and 
apparently  even  of  its  presence.  Their  silence  is 
surprising  ;  it  is  almost  unaccountable.  In  the 
meantime  Christianity  was  leavening  literature, 
philosophy,  art,  government,  and  social  life ;  it  was 
the  force  hidden  in  the  very  heart  of  society  which 
was  to  Some  degree  to  affect  the  whole  Roman 
world.     But  even  in  our  own  day  many  men  are 

^  Delivered  in  connection  with  the  commencement  exercises  of 
the  Newton  Theological  Institution,  Newton,  Mass.,  May  24, 
1892. 

67 


68       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

strangely  thoughtless  as  to  the  place  and  power  of 
Christianity  among  the  roborant  forces  of  modern 
life.  Its  predominance  and  beneficence,  like  the 
majesty  and  glory  of  the  sun,  are  with  many  Chris- 
tians even  matters  of  course.  Some  who  are  the 
foes  of  Christianity  do  not,  because  they  will  not, 
recognize  its  influence  at  its  full  value.  It  was 
prophesied  of  its  divine  Founder  that  "  he  should 
not  cry,  nor  lift  up,  nor  cause  his  voice  to  be  heard 
in  the  street"  ;  and  also  that  "he  shall  bring  forth 
judgment  unto  truth  ;  he  shall  not  fail  nor  be  dis- 
couraged, till  he  have  set  judgment  in  the  earth ; 
and  the  isles  shall  wait  for  his  law." 

Our  Lord's  life  was  a  literal  fulfillment  of  this 
ancient  prophecy.  The  history  of  his  church  since 
his  ascension  is  equally  a  fulfillment  of  the  proph- 
ecy so  far  as  it  relates  to  the  progress  of  Christian 
truth.  Nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  Christ  is 
to  reign  until  all  his  enemies  are  put  under  his  feet, 
and  that  the  gates  of  hades  shall  not  prevail  against 
his  church.  It  is  readily  admitted  that  greater 
prominence  is  given  in  our  day  to  certain  evils  in 
.society  than  was  formerly  the  case.  But  this  is  not 
because  the  evils  are  greater  than  ever  before ;  it  is 
rather  because  the  desire  to  remove  them  is  greater 
than  ever  before.  The  shadows  are  deeper  because 
the  light  is  brighter.  No  quarter  of  a  century  in 
the  world's  history  is  so  marked  with  great  moral 
conflicts  and  conquests  as  is  the  third  quarter  of 
this  century.  We  do  not  hesitate  to  say  that  it  has 
no  parallel  in  any  period,  before  or  since  the  Chris- 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    THE   SECULAR    SPIRIT        69 

tian  era.  We  have  seen  during  this  generation 
many  milhons  of  serfs  emancipated  in  Russia  ;  we 
have  seen  the  temporal  power  of  the  pope  de- 
stroyed and  Victor  Emanuel  in  triumph  entering 
Rome  as  king  of  United  Italy ;  we  have  seen  the 
greatest  civil  war  of  the  world  waged  on  our  own 
soil,  and  ending  in  the  triumph  of  liberty  and  the 
establishment  of  the  republic  on  enduring  founda- 
tions. What  has  been  the  influence  of  Christianity 
in  bringing  about  these  and  other  beneficent  re- 
sults ?  What  is  the  relation  of  Christianity  to  the 
spirit  of  the  times  in  which  we  live  ?  This  is  a 
proper  question.     To  it  a  fair  answer  can  be  given. 

CHRISTIANITY  AND  SCIENCE. 

Let  us,  in  the  first  place,  look  at  the  relation  be- 
tA\'een  Christianity  and  the  scientific  spirit  of  the 
time. 

Many  timid  Christians  think  there  is  a  necessary 
opposition  between  Christianity  and  science.  Many 
narrow-minded  scientists  take  the  same  ground, 
with  an  air  of  triumph  which  is  as  ill  founded  in 
fact  as  it  is  unjustifiable  in  spirit.  Between  estab- 
lished science  and  Christianity  there  is  not,  there 
cannot  be,  contradiction.  God  is  one ;  truth  is 
one.  God  cannot  contradict  himself;  what  he  has 
written  in  his  word,  if  rightly  understood,  must 
harmonize  with  what  he  has  written  in  his  world,  if 
properly  interpreted.  Christianity  welcomes  all 
forms  of  right  inquiry  ;  her  spirit  builds  our  acad- 
emies, our  colleges,  and  our  schools  of  professional 


70       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

learning.  We  frankly  admit  that  the  church  at 
times  has  acted  ignorantly,  bigotedly,  and  wickedly 
toward  science  and  scientists.  Unfortunately, 
science  and  scientists  have  acted  with  equal  igno- 
rance, bigotry,  and  wickedness  toward  the  church. 

The  church  for  the  most  part  has  now  been  con- 
verted, and  science  has  also  to  some  degree  ex- 
perienced a  change  of  heart ;  but  it  ought  to  be 
remembered  that  if  the  church  in  the  Middle  Ages 
was  hostile  to  science,  science  at  that  time  was  so 
unscientific  as  to  be  worthy  of  but  little  respect. 
Perhaps  the  case  of  Galileo  and  his  ecclesiastical 
opponents  has  already  done  sufficient  service  in  il- 
lustrating the  ignorance  and  bigotry  of  the  church ; 
but  there  are  some  sides  to  the  subject  which  are 
not  often  presented.  The  church  of  that  day  was 
no  fair  representative  of  the  church  of  later  days. 
Religion  and  science,  both  and  equally,  were  in  sad 
need  of  a  reformation.  To  make  the  church  of  to- 
day responsible  for  the  church  of  that  day  would  be 
as  unfair,  as  unscientific,  as  to  make  the  science  of 
to-day  responsible  for  all  the  vagaries  of  the  so- 
called  science  of  that  day.  It  is  humiliating  that 
not  only  did  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  of  the 
time  oppose  Galileo,  but  even  Luther  and  Melanc- 
thon  wrote  against  the  Copernican  system.  They 
regarded  it  as  opposed  to  the  authority  of  the 
Bible. 

Galileo's  teachings  triumphed  when  clear  evi- 
dence was  adduced  for  their  support.  But  it  is 
to    be    remembered     and     constantly    emphasized 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    THE   SECULAR    SPIRIT         7 1 

that  those  who  first  excited  persecution  against 
Gahleo  were  not  ecclesiastics  but  scientists.  This 
was  natural.  His  teachings  corrected  their  igno- 
rance ;  they  must  either  confess  it  or  attack  him. 
It  was  natural  that  they  should  do  the  latter,  and 
they  did  it  with  a  will.  These  were  the  men — men 
of  science — who  obliged  him  to  fly  from  Pisa  and 
to  seek  the  protection  of  Salviati.  It  was,  of 
course,  guilty  presumption  in  him  to  contradict, 
"  by  experiments  made  from  the  top  of  the  Lean- 
ing Tower,  the  theorem  of  Aristotle  which  declared 
that  'the  velocity  of  the  motion  of  falling  bodies  is 
in  proportion  to  their  weight'  "  Out  of  this  op- 
position and  flight  came  the  professorship  in  the 
University  of  Padua.  Some  of  his  subsequent 
troubles  came  when  he  left  the  sphere  of  science 
and  entered  the  domain  of  Scripture  interpretation. 
He  declared  "that  in  Scripture  there  were  prop- 
ositions which  were  false  in  the  literal  sense  of  the 
words  .  .  .  and  that  in  all  natural  questions  philo- 
sophical argument  should  have  more  weight  than 
mere  scriptural  declaration."  To  this  bold  utter- 
ance the  reply  of  Cardinal  Baronius  was  as  consider- 
ate as  it  was  conclusive  :  "  The  Scriptures  were 
given  to  teach  men  how  to  rise  to  heaven,  not  how 
the  heavens  were  made."  But  the  court  of  Rome 
and  the  inquisitors  of  the  Sacred  Congregation  of 
the  Index,  before  whom  he  was  summoned,  de- 
clared that  the  Copernican  theory  of  the  revolu- 
tion of  the  earth  was  not  only  false  in  itself  but  was 
contrary  tp  Scripture.     These  titled  dignitaries,  the 


72       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

infallible  pope  and  the  erudite  Congregation,  antici- 
pated the  conclusions  to  which  John  Jasper  has 
come  in  our  day  by  his  own  method  of  investiga- 
tion. Augustine  affirmed  that  the  idea  of  an  An- 
tipodes was  unscriptural,  for  how  could  those  who 
lived  there  see  the  Lord  when  he  should  return  to 
the  earth  ?  Once  many  churchmen  believed  that 
the  earth  stood  still,  and  the  sun  revolved  around 
it  ;  and  they  thought  a  denial  of  that  belief  tended 
to  disprove  the  Bible  and  to  destroy  Christianity. 
Luther  condemned  the  Copernican  system ;  he 
thought  that  the  "  upstart  astrologer  "  was  a  fool 
and  was  teaching  contrary  to  Scripture.  Calvin 
also  believed  that  faith  in  Copernicus  was  infidelity 
to  Scripture.  The  Roman,  the  Lutheran,  and  the 
Anglican  churches  all  practically  were  the  John 
Jaspers  of  an  earlier  day. 

The  fact  is  that  every  science  which  has  struggled 
into  recognition  has  had  to  wage  a  fierce  war  with 
ignorant  men  of  science  as  truly  as  with  ignorant 
men  of  theology.  It  is  also  true  that  almost  as 
soon  as  men  of  science  have  agreed  among  them- 
selves as  to  the  recognition  and  place  of  the  new 
science,  theologians  have  been  ready  to  give  it  its 
rightful  recognition  and  place.  It  is  not  necessarily 
to  the  discredit  of  science  and  theology  that  they 
are  slow  to  give  honor  to  every  new  claimant  for  a 
niche  in  the  temple  of  knowledge.  It  is  an  im- 
pertinence for  men  of  science  to  expect  men  of 
theology  to  give  credit  to  the  undigested  think- 
ing and  the  unverified  theories  of  scientific  men. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    THE    SECULAR    SPIRIT         73 

Christianity  wants  truth.  She  welcomes  it  from 
whatever  quarter  it  comes  and  by  whomsoever 
it  is  brought.  She  is  so  sure  of  her  position  that 
she  rejoices  in  it  more  than  in  all  riches.  She  is 
willing  to  buy  it  at  any  price  ;  she  will  sell  it  at 
no  price. 

BIOLOGY   AND    CHRISTOLOGY. 

Newton's  discoveries  also  had  to  fight  their  way 
to  recognition  against  opposition  on  the  part  of 
some  theologians  and  scientists.  Some  theologians 
considered  that  he  was  invading  the  domain  of 
Deity,  was  usurping  God's  place  and  limiting  his 
power,  if  not  driving  him  out  of  the  world.  A 
friend,  who  was  himself  an  expert  in  science  and 
whose  theological  orthodoxy  was  not  suspected, 
wrote  an  able  treatise  defending  Newton  and  com- 
mending his  discoveries.  To-day  no  friend  of 
Christianity  fears  the  discoveries  of  astronomical 
science  in  all  their  broad  and  sublime  ranges.  The 
Christianity  which  feared  these  discoveries  was  re- 
ligiously as  unchristian  as  the  early  astrology  was 
astronomically  unscientific.  We  now  smile  at  the 
follies  of  both.  Men  like  Chalmers  and  Mitchel 
have  shown  the  harmony  between  God's  truths  in 
the  heavens  and  on  the  page  of  inspiration.  We 
now  see  that  the  heavens  are  the  tapestry  into 
which  God  has  woven  some  of  his  most  wondrous 
thoughts.  But  it  is  little  more  than  a  generation 
since  Christians  trembled  for  the  ark  of  God,  and 
unbelievers  rejoiced  that  it  was  fully  and  finally  in 


74       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

the  hands  of  the  Phihstines,  because  both  aHke 
thought  that  astronomy,  and  related  sciences,  were 
to  destroy  the  Bible  and  to  dethrone  God. 

Geology  has  passed  through  a  similar  experience. 
At  present  biology  is  among  the  most  speculative 
of  sciences  ;  it  is  still  in  its  nebulous  state.  Men 
are  still  searching  for  the  origin  of  life.  Evermore 
it  has  eluded  their  search.  Perhaps  it  will  be  dis- 
covered ;  if  it  be  so,  God  will  be  its  author.  It 
seems  to  be  settled,  so  far  as  anything  in  science 
can  be  settled,  that  all  attempts  to  get  life  out  of 
death  have  failed.  Drummond  says  that  "spon- 
taneous generation  has  had  to  be  given  up."  Hux- 
ley affirms  that  the  doctrine  that  life  can  come  only 
from  life  is  "victorious  along  the  whole  line  of  the 
present  day."  And,  contrary  to  his  own  wish, 
Tyndall  says  :  "I  affirm  that  no  shred  of  trustworthy 
experimental  testimony  exists  to  prove  that  life  in 
our  day  has  ever  appeared  independently  of  ante- 
cedent life."  Beyond  this  we  have  not  gone. 
Should  we  go  further,  we  have  no  fears  of  the 
final  result. 

Analogous  statements  may  be  made  regarding 
the  discussion  of  evolution.  Herbert  Spencer  de- 
fines evolution  as  "consisting  in  a  progress  from 
the  homogeneous  to  the  heterogeneous,  from  gen- 
eral to  special,  from  the  simple  to  the  complex." 
Some  hints  of  this  idea  are  found  in  the  earliest 
times.  The  chaotic  or  mundane  egg  was  an  old 
Egyptian  cosmological  myth.  Other  nations  also 
held   to  the   idea  of  a  development  in  creation  ; 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    THE    SECULAR    SPIRIT         75 

some  philosophers  believed  that  "  an  intelligent 
power,  or  ?ious,  infinite  and  self-existent,"  presided 
over  the  atoms,  giving  them  orderly  arrangement ; 
others,  as  represented  in  the  poem  of  Lucretius,  "  De 
Rcmni  Natura"  supposed  that  chance  wrought 
from  numberless  atoms  the  existing  order  of  things. 
Coming  down  at  one  step  to  our  own  day,  Wallace 
and  Darwin,  in  1858,  "separately  proposed  the 
hypothesis  of  the  origin  of  species  by  spontaneous 
variation,  and  survival  of  the  fittest  through  natural 
selection  and  the  struggle  for  existence."  Darwin's 
treatise  on  the  "Origin  of  Species"  appeared  in 
1859.  Then  came  many  supporters  and  opposers. 
Doubtless  the  great  majority  of  the  scientists  of  our 
day  are  on  the  side  of  some  form  of  evolution. 

The  idea  has  been  applied  by  different  writers  to 
sociology,  to  history,  to  mind,  and  to  theology.  Al- 
most no  one  now  doubts  "that  creation  has  had  a 
history  "  ;  that  it  is  the  result  of  a  series  of  acts  run- 
ning through  millions  of  years.  At  the  same  time 
it  is  certain  "  that  as  it  has  been  pursued  in  time, 
so  also  it  has  been  pursued  by  method."  "There 
is  an  observed  order  of  facts  in  the  history  of  crea- 
tion, both  in  the  organic  and  in  the  inorganic 
world."  As  Hartshorne  has  shown.  Prof  Asa 
Gray,  Doctor  McCosh,  Baden  Powell,  the  Duke  of 
Argyll,  and  others,  all  teach  the  view  of  orderly 
creation  by  law,  under  the  immediate  action  of 
divine  power  working  by  natural  causes  or  forces. 
This  power,  as  he  says,  has  been  rightly  described 
as  a  theory,  not  of  supernatural  or  miraculous  inter- 


']6       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

ference,  but  rather  of  creative  evolution.  Mivart 
joins  the  Duke  of  Argyll  in  showing  that  there  is 
no  antagonism  between  creation  and  evolution. 
The  question,  as  they  suggest,  is  simply  whether 
creative  power  was  exerted  only  at  the  beginning 
of  the  process,  or  all  along  the  line  of  development. 
There  are  unbridged  gaps  in  the  theory  of  evolu- 
tion ;  but  we  are  willing  to  admit  that  the  facts 
establish  evolution,  at  least,  as  a  "working  hypoth- 
esis." 

But  does  evolution  eliminate  the  evidences  for 
the  existence  of  the  Creator  and  the  proofs  of 
design  in  his  creation  ?  Scientists,  such  as  Carpen- 
ter, Dana,  Agassiz,  Henry,  Asa  Gray,  and  others 
of  the  highest  class,  deny  the  insufficiency  of  the 
proofs  of  design  in  nature.  They  positively  refuse 
"to  admit  the  elimination  of  special  creative  action, 
or  direct  modification  of  nature,  from  all  periods 
since  the  first  origination  of  the  universe."  As 
Leifchild,  quoted  by  Hartshorne,  says,  "  The  asser- 
tion that  '  no  will  has  evolved  will,'  is  as  absurd  as 
^ex  niJiilo  aliqrdd.'  "  Evolution  implies  an  evolver; 
nothing  can  be  evolved  which  has  not  been  in- 
volved. We  do  not  take  from  God's  power, 
wisdom,  and  glory  because  we  place  his  primal 
creative  act  far  back  in  the  line  of  development ; 
we  add  to  his  glory  by  so  doing.  There  is  a  de- 
velopment in  the  divine  plan  in  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments ;  in  the  dispensations  of  patriarchs, 
prophets,  and  kings,  until  he  came,  who  is  Prophet 
of  prophets  and  King  of  kings.      "  The  law  made 


CHRISTIANITY   AND    THE    SECULAR    SPIRIT         77 

nothing  perfect,  but  the  bringing  in  of  a  better 
hope  did"  (Heb.  7  :  19).  There  is  a  Christian 
evolution  ;  God  is  the  evolver,  and  truth  in  its 
highest  forms  is  the  result.  With  Professor  Gray, 
in  his  address  before  the  American  Association  for 
the  Advancement  of  Science,  in  1872,  as  quoted  by 
Hartshorne,  we  may  well  say  : 

Let  us  hope  that  the  religious  faith  which  survived,  with- 
out a  shock,  the  notion  of  the  fixity  of  the  earth  itself,  may 
equally  outlast  the  notion  of  the  absolute  fixity  of  the 
species  which  inhabit  it  ;  that  in  the  future,  even  more 
than  in  the  past,  faith  in  an  order,  which  is  the  basis  of 
science,  will  not  (as  it  cannot  reasonably)  be  dissevered 
from  faith  in  an  Ordainer,  which  is  the  basis  of  religion. 

Placing  God  farther  back  in  the  line  of  develop- 
ment certainly  does  not  exclude  him.  If  he  has 
given  the  germ  the  power  of  development,  his 
wisdom,  skill,  and  forethought  are  as  conspicuous 
as  if  the  divine  power  were  immediately  exerted. 
A  law  of  development  has  no  power.  Law  is  only 
the  name  which  we  give  to  a  force  observed  to  act 
in  a  special  way.  Back  of  law  is  the  Lawgiver; 
back  of  the  observed  order  of  the  development  is 
the  Ordainer.     There  stands  God. 

CHRISTIANITY    AND    HEATHENISM. 

Another  cause  of  premature  alarm  on  the  part  of 
many  Christians,  and  of  premature  rejoicing  on  the 
part  of  some  enemies  of  Christianity,  is  found  in 
the  spirit  of  historic  inquiry  which  marks  our  time. 
This  inquiry  covers  a  wide  range.     We  may  look 


78       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

at  it,  first,  in  its  relations  to  comparative  religions. 
The  opening  of  great  areas  of  heathendom  to  the 
introduction  of  Christianity  is  at  the  same  time  the 
opening  of  Christendom  to  the  possible  introduction 
of  some  elements  of  heathenism.  This  Christianity 
must  expect ;  this  Christianity  should  welcome. 
Here,  as  in  other  realms,  the  fittest  must  survive. 
The  true  ground  of  the  worship  of  God  is  not  his 
omnipotence,  but  his  goodness.  Mere  almightiness 
might  bend  the  knee,  but  it  could  not  secure  the 
reverent  love  of  the  heart.  We  worship  God  be- 
cause he  is  the  infinitely  best  being  in  the  universe. 
If  there  is  a  better  being  than  God,  that  being 
must  be  our  God.  If  Christianity  cannot  endure, 
when  subjected  to  all  forms  of  practical  testing,  the 
comparison  with  other  religions,  then  Christianity 
must  go,  ought  to  go,  and  certainly  will  go.  The 
world  ought  to  have  the  best ;  it  will  have  the  best. 
Does  any  Christian  fear  this  test?  All  Christians 
must  meet  it.  There  are  certain  philosophers  in 
our  country  who  are  practically  heathen.  Some 
are  Buddhists,  some  Baalists,  some  Confucianists, 
some  Parsees  or  Hindus,  and  some,  practically,  are 
Mohammedans.  To  some  there  is  a  fascination  in 
conceiving  of  heathen  religions  as  developing  by 
some  mysterious  evolution  into  Christianity.  By  a 
similar  process  Christianity,  according  to  this  view, 
may  some  day  develop  into  some  other  form  of 
faith,  and  that  in  turn  may  give  way  to  another 
and  another  until  the  perfect  flower  of  faith  and 
hope  opens  in  consummate  blossom. 


CHRISTIANITY   AND    THE    SECULAR    SPIRIT         79 

All  fair-minded  men  admit  that  in  the  sacred 
books  of  these  non-Christian  religions  there  is 
something  of  beauty,  worth,  and  truth.  Amid 
bushels  of  chaff  some  kernels  of  wheat  are  found  ; 
amid  much  of  rubbish  there  are  diamond  truths. 
It  ought  not  to  startle  us  that  among  heathen 
nations  contemporary  with  the  early  years  of 
biblical  teaching,  truths  similar  to  those  taught 
in  the  Bible  are  found.  Much  of  this  truth, 
doubtless,  found  its  way  among  the  heathen  na- 
tions from  the  people  of  God ;  much  of  the  light 
of  heathenism  came  from  torches  kindled  on  He- 
brew altars.  All  of  it  certainly  came  by  some 
means  from  God.  He  alone  is  the  Sun  of  the 
moral  universe.  "God  is  light,  and  in  him  is  no 
darkness  at  all."  We  have  the  Apostle  Peter  as 
our  authority  in  the  noble  utterance  that  "in  every 
nation  he  that  feareth  him  (God),  and  worketh 
righteousness,  is  accepted  with  him."  The  writings 
of  Mr.  Edwin  Arnold  have  done  much,  in  opening 
up  the  wealth  of  that  gorgeous  East,  to  commend 
the  religions  of  Buddha  and  Mohammed ;  other 
influences  have  commended  the  teachings  of  Con- 
fucius and  the  rituals  of  the  Parsees.  A  poetic 
glamour  has  been  thrown  over  these  ancient  faiths, 
adding  splendor  to  what  in  them  is  beautiful  and 
concealing  what  is  hideous.  Many  men  who  are 
strangely  incredulous  about  everything  Christian 
are  hopelessly  credulous  about  everything  non- 
Christian.  We  have  seen  these  faiths  making  con- 
verts of  missionaries  sent  into  their  lands,  and  even 


80       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

coming  to  our  land  to  push  their  conquests  among 
some  devotees  of  a  dreamy,  mystical  culture.  The 
discussions  now  rife  in  England,  and  to  some  degree 
in  America,  regarding  Dr.  Blyden's  admitted  ten- 
dencies toward  Islam,  and  Canon  Taylor's  con- 
cession regarding  its  influence  in  Africa,  point  in 
the  same  direction.  Those  who  knew  Dr.  Blyden's 
history  and  character  are  not  much  surprised  at  his 
present  attitude,  and  it  is  certain  that  Canon  Tay- 
lor's opinions  are  largely  influenced  by  one-sided 
authorities.  Christians,  however,  have  reason  to  hide 
their  heads  in  shame  when  fiends  in  human  form 
in  Christian  countries  are  furnishing  these  ignorant 
Africans  with  liquor  which  is  making  their  degra- 
dation deeper  and  their  future  darker  than  before. 
Just  at  the  point  where  the  argument  from  com- 
parative religions  was  pressed  against  Christianity, 
two  noted  witnesses  arose  to  give  their  testimony 
in  favor  of  Christianity.  They  are  Sir  Monier  Wil- 
liams, professor  of  Sanscrit  in  the  University  of 
Oxford,  and  Professor  Max  Miiller.  Both  of  these 
men  have  spent  years  in  the  study  of  these  ancient 
religions  ;  few  men  are  so  familiar  with  the  teach- 
ings which  some  desire  to  put  in  competition  with 
Christianity.  Their  tastes  and  tendencies  might 
make  them  incline  toward  these  non-Christian  re- 
ligions. Indeed,  Professor  Muller  showed  a  little 
time  ago  a  decided  bias  in  their  favor.  This  writer 
distinctly  remembers  how  unfavorably  his  own  mind 
was  once  affected  toward  Christianity  by  Professor 
Miiller's  elaborate  work  on  "The  Origin  and  Growth 


CHRISTIANITY   AND    THE    SECULAR    SPIRIT         8 1 

of  Religions."  Sir  Monier  Williams  is  free  to  con- 
fess that  when  he  began  investigating  Hinduism 
and  Buddhism,  he  also  was  prejudiced  in  their 
favor.  As  a  result  of  his  earlier  and  incomplete 
studies,  he  began  to  be  a  believer  in  the  evolution 
and  growth  of  religious  thought ;  he  considered 
these  faiths  to  be  steps  in  the  development  of  re- 
ligious aspirations  struggling  toward  Christianity. 
Now  he  affirms  his  mistake.  He  denounces  the 
"flabby,  jellyfish  toleration"  which  refuses  to  see 
the  difference  between  what  is  Christian  and  what 
is  non-Christian.  He  ends  his  address  at  the  late 
anniversary  of  the  Church  Missionary  Society,  in 
London,  with  these  remarkable  and  eloquent  words : 

Go  forth  then,  ye  missionaries,  in  your  Master's  name  ; 
go  forth  into  all  the  world,  and  after  studying  all  its  false 
religions  and  philosophies,  go  forth  and  fearlessly  proclaim 
to  suffering  humanity  the  plain,  the  unchangeable,  the  eter- 
nal facts  of  the  gospel — nay,  I  might  almost  say,  the  stub- 
born, the  unyielding,  the  inexorable  facts  of  the  gospel. 
Dare  to  be  downright  with  all  the  uncompromising  courage 
of  your  own  Bible,  while  with  it  your  watchwords  are  love, 
joy,  peace,  reconciliation.  Be  fair,  be  charitable,  be  Christ- 
like ;  but  let  there  be  no  mistake.  Let  it  be  made  abso- 
lutely clear  that  Christianity  cannot,  must  not,  be  watered 
down  to  suit  the  palate  of  either  Hindu,  Parsee,  Confucian- 
ist,  Buddhist,  or  Mohammedan  ;  and  whosoever  wishes  to 
pass  from  the  false  religion  to  the  true  can  never  hope  to  do 
so  by  the  rickety  planks  of  compromise,  or  by  the  help  of 
faltering  hands  held  out  by  half-hearted  Christians.  He 
must  leap  the  gulf  in  faith,  and  the  living  Christ  will  spread 
his  everlasting  arms  beneath  and  land  him  safe  on  the 
eternal  Rock. 

F 


82       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

In  Max  Miiller's  address  given  before  the  British 
and  Foreign  Bible  Society,  equally  strong  language 
in  favor  of  Christianity  is  used.  After  having  named 
the  Veda  of  the  Brahmins,  the  Puranas  of  Siva 
and  Vishnu,  the  Koran  of  the  Mohammedans,  the 
Zend-Avesta  of  the  Parsees,  and  the  Tripitaka  of 
the  Buddhists,  he  goes  on  to  say  : 

They  all  say  that  salvation  must  be  purchased,  must  be 
bought  with  a  price,  and  that  the  sole  price,  the  sole  pur- 
chase-money, must  be  our  own  works  and  deservings.  Our 
own  holy  Bible,  our  sacred  book  of  the  East,  is  from  begin- 
ning to  end  a  protest  against  this  doctrine.  Good  works 
are,  indeed,  enjoined  upon  us  in  that  sacred  book  of  the 
East,  but  they  are  only  the  outcome  of  a  grateful  heart ; 
they  are  only  a  thank  offering,  the  fruits  of  our  faith.  They 
are  never  the  ransom-money  of  the  true  disciples  of  Christ. 
Let  us  not  shut  our  eyes  to  what  is  excellent  and  true  and 
of  good  report  in  those  sacred  books,  but  let  us  teach  Hin- 
dus, Buddhists,  Mohammedans,  that  there  is  only  one  sacred 
book  of  the  East  that  can  be  their  mainstay  in  that  awful 
hour  when  they  shall  pass  alone  into  the  unseen  world.  It 
is  the  sacred  book  which  contains  that  faithful  saying, 
worthy  to  be  received  of  all  men,  women,  and  children,  and 
not  merely  of  us  Christians,  ' '  that  Jesus  Christ  came  into 
the  world  to  save  sinners." 

These  words  are  timely ;  they  thrill  and  rejoice 
our  hearts.  It  is  clear  that  the  most  advanced 
students  in  these  wide  fields  bring  back  testimony 
to  the  exclusive  claims  of  Christianity  to  be  the 
faith  of  the  race.  The  men  who  go  deep  into 
Christianity  and  its  relations  with  other  religions  do 
not  fail  to  give  their  testimony  in  its  favor.     It  is 


CHRISTIANITY   AND    THE    SECULAR    SPIRIT         83 

the  men  who  have  picked  up  a  "httle  learning"  at 
second  hand  that  are  found  to  oppose  the  claims 
of  Christianity  when  compared  with  other  religions. 
Shallow  scholars  are  ever  noisy  critics.  Quite  fre- 
quently those  who  know  least  assert  the  most. 

There  is  not  the  slightest  doubt  but  that  in  the 
end  good  will  come  out  of  the  discussion  of  the 
relative  merits  of  Christianity  and  Islam  in  Africa 
to-day.  The  errors  in  Christianity,  so  far  as  it  is 
held  responsible  for  the  liquor  traffic  and  kindred 
evils,  will  be  corrected,  and  its  superiority  will  be 
discovered  and  declared.  The  Cross  and  not  the 
crescent  is  destined  to  rule  the  world. 

All  the  historical  and  topographical  inquiries 
now  going  on  in  Bible  lands  will,  we  fully  believe, 
result  in  giving  additional  testimony  to  the  truth  of 
God's  word  and  the  value  of  Christianity.  We 
welcome  such  investigations.  From  hoary  rocks, 
from  Egyptian  sands,  and  from  ivy-covered  ruins 
God  is  raising  up  witnesses  in  support  of  our  Chris- 
tian faith.  It  is  equally  certain  that  the  fierce  fires 
of  historical  criticism  through  which  the  Bible  is 
now  passing  will  not  in  the  end  shake  the  faith  of 
true  disciples.  It  is  barely  possible  that  Shakes- 
peare will  live  when  Ignatius  Donnelly  is  dead. 
Homer  survives,  although  the  names  of  the  critics 
who  denied  that  he  ever  lived  are  fast  passing  out 
of  memory.  Some  of  our  interpretations  of  the 
Bible  may  have  to  be  modified,  some  theories 
abandoned ;  but  God's  eternal  truth  shall  abide : 
"The  word  of  our  God  shall  stand  forever." 


84       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 
CHRISTIANITY   AND    SOCIOLOGY. 

When  we  come  to  the  relation  between  Christi- 
anity and  the  social  problems  of  the  time,  we  find 
cause  for  greater  activity  in  disseminating  the  princi- 
ples of  Christianity,  but  no  cause  for  distrust  in  its 
divine  claims,  noble  achievements,  or  practical  possi- 
bilities. When  socialism  assumes  the  form  of  an- 
archy, there  can  be  no  relation  between  it  and 
Christianity  but  one  of  "irrepressible  conflict." 
Christianity  favors  liberty ;  but  liberty  is  not  license. 
Liberty  is  obedience  to  just  law ;  the  highest  liberty 
is  submission  to  God  and  conformity  to  his  will  as 
revealed  in  his  word.  Anarchy  is  un-American, 
unmanly,  and  ungodly.  It  is  a  plant  of  foreign 
production,  a  Satanic  exotic  which  can  never  be- 
come fully  rooted  in  American  soil.  When  social- 
ism becomes  anarchy,  it  is  fit  only  for  destruction. 
When  men  come  to  America  with  a  red  flag  in  one 
hand  and  a  dynamite  bomb  in  the  other,  they  must 
be  quarantined  for  their  natural  lives.  An  exami- 
nation of  the  lives  of  the  anarchists  recently  hanged 
shows  that  they  never  had  any  Christian  training. 
Had  they  been  educated  in  its  doctrines,  they  would 
never  have  made,  certainly  would  never  have  hurled, 
the  fatal  bomb.  They  learned  to  think  of  Christi- 
anity as  their  enemy ;  they,  in  turn,  became  its  ene- 
mies. 

These  facts  are  worthy  of  careful  considera- 
tion by  all  Christians  and  all  other  citizens.  We 
cannot  afford  to  neglect  the  Christian  training  of 


CHRISTIANITY   AND    THE    SECULAR    SPIRIT         8$ 

any  of  our  people ;  we  must  do  our  part  toward 
training  all  the  nations  of  the  earth,  especially  those 
whose  representatives  are  likely  to  come  to  us. 
Atheism  is  anarchistic.  Sow  infidelity  and  you 
reap  anarchism,  impurity,  death.  Every  atheist  is 
at  heart  an  anarchist.  Anarchism  is  the  flower  and 
fruit  of  atheism.  No  consistent  infidel  is,  or  can  be, 
a  good  citizen.  True  Christianity  alone  is  the  har- 
monizer  of  all  the  conflicting  interests  of  society. 
It  is  the  true  anti-poverty  and  the  true  temperance 
society.  It  alone  can  elevate  the  "masses";  it 
alone  can  reclaim  the  fallen. 

Dr.  Alexander  McLeod,  in  his  *' Chris tus  Con- 
solator,'"  says  that  "when  Oersted  first  exhibited 
to  Frederika  Bremer  the  beautiful  and  now  famil- 
iar experiment  of  sand-grains  upon  a  glass  plate 
arranging  themselves,  under  the  influence  of  a 
musical  note,  in  symmetrical  and  harmonious 
figures,  this  reflection  passed  through  the  mind 
of  the  lady:  'A  human  hand  made  the  stroke 
that  produced  the  note.  But  when  the  stroke 
is  made  by  the  hand  of  the  Almighty,  will  not 
the  note  then  produced  bring  into  exquisitely 
harmonious  form  those  sand-grains  which  are  hu- 
man beings,  communities,  nations?  It  will  arrange 
the  world  in  oeauty,  and  there  shall  be  no  discord 
and  no  lamentation  any  more.'  "  This  woman  is 
right.  All  that  is  true  in  communism  is  the  off- 
spring of  Christ's  religion ;  all  that  is  evil  in  com- 
munism is  opposed  by  his  gospel.  His  religion  is 
the  cure  for  all  the  evils  existing  between  employer 


86       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and  employed.  Put  Christ  fully  into  the  hearts  of 
both  and  injustice,  oppression,  and  strikes  will  be 
impossible. 

Count  Tolstoi  is  feeling  after  Christ.  There 
is  a  Christian  communism.  It  furnishes  the  only 
true,  noble  fellowship.  Religion  now,  as  in  all 
the  past,  lifts  nations  and  races  out  of  barbarism 
into  civilization,  out  of  sin  into  holiness,  from  earth 
to  heaven.  So-called  reformers  and  humanitarians 
who  are  infidel  to  Christ  and  his  gospel  are  the 
enemies  of  the  poor,  the  enemies  of  the  republic, 
the  enemies  of  the  race.  Those  who  would  lift 
their  hand  against  the  Bible,  against  the  Sabbath, 
against  Christ,  are  the  enemies  of  the  best  interests 
of  all  classes  for  time  as  well  as  for  eternity. 

Religion  would  vastly  reduce  the  number  of  the 
poor.  It  is  the  friend  of  industry  and  all  kindred 
virtues  ;  it  is  the  foe  of  intemperance  and  all  kindred 
vices.  The  poor  do  not  so  much  need  bread  as 
the  character  and  the  opportunity  to  earn  bread. 
Religion  in  the  heart  to  a  large  degree  will  give 
both.  Much  is  said  about  carrying  the  loaf  with  the 
tract.  The  idea  has  in  it  truth,  but  it  has  been  over 
worked.  It  is  instructive  to  remember  that  only 
twice  did  Christ  use  divine  power  to  give  bread  to 
the  multitude,  and  in  both  cases  the  circumstances 
were  peculiar.  The  poor  need  the  religion  of 
Christ  more  than  earthly  bread.  There  were  as 
many  evils,  as  Dr.  McLeod  suggests,  in  Christ's 
day  as  now.  There  were  then  the  lapsed  classes, 
the  dwellers  in  lanes,  the  victims  of  sin  and  misery 


CHRISTIANITY   AND    THE   SECULAR    SPIRIT         8/ 

of  every  kind.  What  was  Christ's  cure  ?  Evangel- 
ize them.  Did  he  blunder?  Was  he  lacking  in 
gentleness  and  love  ?  He  was  the  true  reformer, 
the  divine  humanitarian,  the  spiritual  regenerator 
of  the  individual  and  the  race.  There  was  a  pro- 
found philosophy  in  his  method.  His  spirit  teaches 
the  poor  and  the  rich  alike  to  recognize  the  poor 
man's  manhood.  This  is  a  recognition  of  tremen- 
dous power.  It  gives  hope,  light,  life  to  the  poor. 
It  gives  those  who  are  up  tenderness  for  those  who 
are  down  ;  and  those  who  are  down  trustfulness 
toward  those  who  are  up.  Christ's  incarnation  has 
lifted  the  world  into  the  sunshine  of  hope  and  the 
promise  of  heaven.  It  has  leveled  society  by  lift- 
ing the  downtrodden — leveled  it  up.  Guizot  says 
that 

Christianity  has  carried  repentance  even  into  the  souls  of 
nations.  Pagan  antiquity  knew  nothing  of  these  awaken- 
ings of  the  public  conscience.  Tacitus  could  only  deplore 
the  decay  of  the  ancient  rites  of  Rome,  and  Marcus  Aure- 
lius  could  only  wrap  himself  sorrowfully  up  in  the  stoical 
isolation  of  the  sage  ;  there  is  nothing  to  show  that  these 
superior  minds  so  much  as  suspected  the  great  crimes  of 
their  social  state,  even  in  its  best  days,  or  aspired  to  reform 
them. 

The  world's  hope  in  every  relation  in  life  is  this 
old  gospel.  It  must  have  its  place  in  every  heart ; 
it  must  throw  its  radiance  over  every  home  ;  it 
must  be  in  every  workshop  and  counting-house. 

The  spirit  of  the  world  divides  society  horizon- 
tally, each  class  selecting  its  corresponding  layer. 


88       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  spirit  of  Christianity  divides  society  vertically, 
cutting  through  all  the  layers.  True  religion  says, 
whether  a  man  be  black  or  white,  red  or  yellow, 
rich  or  poor,  "A  man's  a  man  for  a'  that."  Away 
with  the  sentimental  but  Christless  philanthropist ! 
Away  with  the  blatant  and  blasphemous  infidel ! 
The  true  friend  of  the  rich,  the  poor,  the  fallen,  of 
all  classes,  is  Jesus  Christ,  the  perfect,  the  Divine 
Man. 


IV 
REASONS  FOR  BEING  A  BAPTIST^ 

THE  question,  "  Why  am  I  a  Baptist  ?  "  I  should 
answer  by  saying  that  it  is  because  I  believe 
that  Baptist  doctrines  are  the  doctrines  of  the  New 
Testament,  as  interpreted  alike  by  the  highest 
scholarship  and  by  the  understanding  of  unlearned 
but  devout  readers ;  and,  furthermore,  because 
these  doctrines  are  in  many  respects  in  harmony 
with  the  views  adopted  by  the  best  thought  of  to- 
day, whether  in  the  churches  or  without.  If  one 
were  asked  to  state  the  fundamental  idea  of  the 
Baptists,  he  might  give  it  as  this  :  Personal  faith  in 
the  Lord  Jesus  alone  saves  the  soul  ;  or,  stating 
the  thought  negatively  in  its  relation  to  baptism, 
baptism  will  not  make  a  man  a  Christian.  He 
might  also  enlarge  the  thought  by  saying  :  Obedi- 
ence to  the  will  of  Christ  as  expressed  in  the  in- 
spired Scriptures,  including  personal  faith  in  Christ 
as  the  ground  of  salvation,  baptism  into  the  name 
of  the  Trinity  as  the  profession  of  that  faith,  and 
loyalty  to  Christ  in  all  other  things  which  he  has 
commanded.      A  Christian  should,  of  course,    be 

^  Delivered  in  the  Lexington  Avenue  Baptist  Church,  New 
York  City,  April  l6,  1893,  in  an  interdenominational  series  of 
Sunday  evening  addresses,  and  published  in  the  "Treasury," 
April,  1897. 

89 


90       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

baptized,  as  a  soldier  should  put  on  a  uniform  ; 
but  as  it  is  not  putting  on  the  uniform  which  makes 
a  man  a  soldier,  so  it  is  not  baptism  that  makes  a 
man  a  Christian.  The  man  puts  on  the  uniform 
because  he  is  already  a  soldier ;  and  so  a  man 
should  be  baptized  when  he  has  become  a  Chris- 
tian. A  true  church,  therefore,  consists  of  truly- 
regenerated  persons,  who  have  been  baptized  on 
the  profession  of  their  faith.  Thus,  Baptists  refuse 
to  give  baptism  to  unconscious  infants.  They  bap- 
tize only  those  whom  they  believe  to  have  already 
become  Christians,  only  those  who  show  evidence 
of  having  met  with  an  internal  spiritual  change. 

Till  a  recent  date  the  idea  that  baptism  will  not 
make  one  a  Christian  was  distinctively  a  Baptist 
doctrine  ;  in  the  Middle  Ages  all  but  Baptists  held 
the  doctrine  of  baptismal  regeneration.  If  one 
had  been  baptized,  it  was  assumed  by  most  church- 
men that  he  had  been  made  a  Christian,  and,  with- 
out any  demand  for  evidence  that  he  was  changed 
in  character,  he  was  admitted  to  all  the  rights  of 
the  church.  This  is  true,  for  the  most  part,  among 
the  Roman  Catholics,  Episcopalians,  and  Lutherans 
of  to-day,  and  to  some  degree  even  among  those 
who  claim  to  be  more  evangelical.  All  who  were 
baptized  in  infancy  are  considered  to  be  Christians, 
though  they  show  no  evidence  whatever  of  an  in- 
ternal spiritual  change.  The  rapid  growth  of  Bap- 
tist churches  in  modern  times  results  from  a  more 
general  discarding  of  the  doctrine  that  baptism  will 
make   a  man   a   Christian.       Evangelical    revivals, 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  9 1 

like  those  of  the  days  of  Edwards  and  Whitefield,  or 
like  those  which  follow  Mr.  Moody's  preaching,  add 
greatly  to  Baptists'  numbers.  When  Mr.  Moody 
says  that  baptism  will  not  make  a  Christian,  that 
no  man  is  a  Christian  till  he  has  truly  repented  and 
exercised  personal  faith  in  Jesus  Christ,  people  ask, 
"Why  then  should  infants  be  baptized?" 

They  adopt  the  Baptist  principle,  that  as  no  man 
puts  on  the  military  uniform  till  he  has  already  en- 
listed as  a  soldier,  so  no  one  should  be  baptized  till 
he  has  already  repented  and  believed  and  become 
a  Christian. 

THE    NEW    TESTAMENT    PRINCIPLE. 

Now,  the  Baptist  principle  is  the  New  Testa- 
ment principle.  When  certain  Pharisees  asked 
John  the  Baptist  to  baptize  them,  he  told  them 
they  must  bring  forth  fruits  meet  for  repentance  ; 
that  baptizing  them  would  not  make  them  holy 
men  ;  that  they  must  first  give  evidence  of  repent- 
ance, and  then  they  could  be  baptized.  First,  be- 
lief, and  then  baptism,  then  the  Lord's  Supper ; 
this  is  the  New  Testament  order,  and  this  is  the 
order  of  the  Baptist  churches  still.  This  Baptist 
idea,  that  baptism  will  not  make  a  man  a  Christian, 
that  it  is  unreasonable  to  baptize  him  till  he  has 
already  met  with  a  change  of  heart,  commands  the 
approval  of  all  sensible  men  outside  of  the  church, 
and  it  is  being  rapidly  adopted  by  all  the  more 
evangelical  religious  bodies.  These  churches  must 
make  more  of  infant  baptism  or  less. 


92       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

There  is  absolutely  no  place  for  infant  baptism 
in  an  evangelical  system  of  theology.  Those  who 
believe  in  baptismal  regeneration  are  logical,  though 
unscriptural  ;  those  who  do  not  so  believe  and  who 
practise  infant  baptism  are  both  illogical  and  un- 
scriptural. Many  evangelical  churches  are  begin- 
ning to  realize  their  inconsistency.  Not  nearly  so 
many  infants  are  baptized  among  the  Presbyterians, 
Congregationalists,  and  Methodists  as  among  the 
Roman  Catholics,  Episcopalians,  and  Lutherans. 
Why  is  this  ?  It  is  because,  while  the  last-named 
churches  still  adhere  to  the  doctrine  of  baptismal 
regeneration,  the  first,  for  the  most  part,  have  aban- 
doned it,  and  they  are  coming  more  and  more  to 
see  that  if  baptism  will  not  make  a  child  a  Chris- 
tian, there  is  no  reason  for  baptizing  the  child. 

AUTHORITIES    AGAINST    INFANT    BAPTISM. 

I  unhesitatingly  assert  that  there  is  not  in  the 
New  Testament  a  single  command  for,  or  example 
of,  infant  baptism.  If  there  were,  it  could  easily  be 
found,  but  no  one  yet  has  made  this  discovery. 
How  can  men  who  adopt  the  famous  dictum  of 
Chillingworth,  "  the  Bible,  and  the  Bible  only,  the 
religion  of  Protestants,"  practise  infant  baptism  ? 
In  so  doing  they  at  once  depart  from  their  funda- 
mental principle  ;  they  cannot  successfully  antago- 
nize the  "  churchianity  "  and  traditionalism  of  the 
Church  of  Rome.  Secular  common  sense  and  the 
evangelical  religious  thought  of  to-day  are  in  this 
respect  in  harmony  with  the  New  Testament.     The 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  93 

scholarship  of  the  world  is  in  agreement  with  this 
view.  Many  more  authorities  might  be  cited,  but 
the  following  are  sufficient : 

Luther  says  :  "  It  cannot  be  proved  by  the  sacred 
Scriptures  that  infant  baptism  was  instituted  by 
Christ,  or  begun  by  the  first  Christians  after  the 
Apostles."  ^ 

Neander  says  :  "  Baptism  was  administered  at 
first  only  to  adults,  as  men  were  accustomed  to 
conceive  of  baptism  and  faitJi  as  strictly  connected. 
We  have  all  reason  for  not  deriving  infant  baptism 
from  apostolic  institution."  ^ 

Prof  Lange  says:  "All  attempts  to  make  out 
infant  baptism  from  the  New  Testament  fail.  It  is 
totally  opposed  to  the  spirit  of  the  apostolic  age, 
and  to  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament." ^ 

Dr.  Hanna  says  :  "  Scripture  knows  nothing  of 
the  baptism  of  infants."  * 

Tertullian  is  the  first  who  mentions  the  custom, 
and  he  opposes  it.  This  was  at  the  close  of  the 
second  century,  or  about  a.  d.  200.  His  opposi- 
tion to  it  proves  two  things  :  First,  that  it  was  in 
occasional  use,  at  least.  Second,  that  it  was  of 
recent  origin,  since  had  it  been  long  used  some 
earlier  record  of  it  could  be  found.^ 

1  "  Vanity  of  Inf.  Bap.,"  Part.  II.,  p.  8. 

2  "Ch.  Hist.,"  Vol.   I.,  p.  3H  ;   "Plant,  and    Train.,"  Vol. 

I.,  p.   222. 

^  "  Inf.  Bapt.,"  p.  loi. 

*  "North  Brit.  Review,"  August,  1852. 

*  Neander,  "Ch.  Hist.,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  311. 


94       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

"  All  students  of  ecclesiastical  history  know  that 
at  an  early  period  corruptions  perverted  Christian 
faith  and  practice.  Among  these,  one  of  the  ear- 
liest was  that  of  an  undue  efficacy  attributed  to 
baptism.  Its  sanctity  was  so  exalted  that  it  was 
believed  to  have  power  to  wash  away  sins,  and 
cleanse  the  soul  for  heaven.  By  it  the  sick  were 
supposed  to  be  prepared  for  death,  and  salvation 
made  more  certain  by  its  efficacy.  Anxious  parents, 
therefore,  desired  their  dying  children  to  be  thus 
prepared — 'washed  in  the  laver  of  regeneration,' 
as  it  was  termed — that  they  might  be  sure  of  salva- 
tion. And  here  came  in  that  pernicious  error  of 
'  baptismal  regeneration,'  which  gave  rise  to  infant 
baptism,  and  which  has  through  all  these  ages 
clung  with  more  or  less  pertinacity  to  the  clergy 
and  laity  of  all  churches  which  have  practised  it"  ^ 

Prof  Lange's  words  are  weighty,  and  should  be 
carefully  pondered  by  Protestant  defenders  of  this 
papal  emanation.  He  says:  "Would  the  Prot- 
estant church  fulfill  and  attain  to  its  final  destiny, 
the  baptism  of  new-born  children  must  of  necessity 
be  abolished.  It  has  sunk  down  to  a  mere  formal- 
ity, without  any  meaning  for  the  child."  ^ 

BAPTISM    NOT    NECESSARY    TO    SALVATION. 

Another  statement  of  the  Baptist  principle  is  this  : 
Baptism  is  not  necessary  to  salvation.  The  asser- 
tion sometimes  made  that  Baptists  hold   that  no 

1  Dr.  Edward  T.  Hiscox,  "Baptist  Standard  Manual,"  p.  134. 
*  "Hist,  of  Protestantism, "  p.  34. 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  95 

man  can  be  saved  unless  he  is  baptized,  is  the 
falsest  and  most  absurd  declaration  in  ecclesias- 
tical controversy.  It  is  difficult  to  speak  with 
courtesy  of  such  ignorance  or  malice.  The  very 
reason  why  Baptists  practise  baptism,  and  not 
some  substitute  for  it,  such  as  pouring  or  sprin- 
kling, is  the  fact  that  they  hold  that  baptism  is 
in  no  way  essential  to  salvation.  The  history 
of  the  matter  is  this  :  The  baptism  of  the  apos- 
tolic churches  was  immersion,  if  the  tautology 
of  the  expression  may  be  permitted.  So  say 
Luther,  Calvin,  and  Wesley  ;  so  say  all  standard 
church  historians,  as  Dr.  Philip  Schaff]  Dean 
Stanley,  Neander,  Hase,  Guericke,  and  Kurtz. 
On  this  point  there  is  absolutely  no  difference  of 
opinion  among  specialists  in  church  history.  No 
writer  worthy  of  being  classed  with  the  historians 
named  would  dissent  from  their  position.  There 
is  no  proof  that  sprinkling  was  ever  practised  be- 
fore the  middle  of  the  third  century.  Take  the 
following  among  many  other  learned  witnesses  to 
the  meaning  of  baptism  : 

Grimm's  "Lexicon  of  the  New  Testament," 
which  in  Europe  and  America  stands  confessedly 
at  the  head  of  Greek  lexicography,  as  translated 
and  edited  by  Prof  Thayer,  of  Harvard  University, 
thus  defines  baptizo :  "(i)  To  dip  repeatedly,  to 
immerse,  submerge.  (2)  To  cleanse  by  dipping  or 
submerging.  (3)  To  overwhelm.  In  the  New 
Testament  it  is  used  particularly  of  the  rite  of 
sacred  ablution  ;  first  instituted  by  John  the  Bap- 


96       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tist,  afterward  by  Christ's  command  received  by- 
Christians  and  adjusted  to  the  contents  and  nature 
of  their  rehgion,  viz.,  an  unmcrsion  in  water,  per- 
formed as  a  sign  of  the  removal  of  sin,  and  admin- 
istered to  those  who,  impelled  by  a  desire  for  salva- 
tion, sought  admission  to  the  benefits  of  the  Mes- 
siah's .  kingdom.  With  eis  to  mark  the  element 
into  which  the  immersion  is  made  ;  ai  with  the 
dative  of  the  thing  in  which  one  is  immersed." 

Prof  Moses  Stuart,  one  of  the  ablest  scholars 
America  has  produced,  declared  :  "  Baptizo  means 
to  dip,  plunge,  or  immerse  into  any  liquid.  All  lex- 
icographers and  critics  of  any  note  are  agreed  in 
this."  ^ 

"The  Greek  language,"  as  Dr.  Hiscox  has  said, 
"  is  rich  in  terms  for  the  expression  of  all  positive 
ideas,  and  all  varying  shades  of  thought.  Why 
then  did  our  Lord  in  commanding,  and  his  apostles 
in  transmitting  his  command  to  posterity,  use  al- 
ways and  only  that  one  word  baptizo,  to  describe 
the  action,  and  that  one  word  baptisma,  to  describe 
the  ordinance  to  which  he  intended  all  his  followers 
to  submit?  The  word  louo  means  to  wash  the 
body,  and  nipto  to  wash  parts  of  the  body ;  but 
these  words  are  not  used,  because  washing  is  not 
what  Christ  meant.  Rantizo  means  to  sprinkle, 
and  if  sprinkling  were  baptism  this  would  have 
been  the  word  above  all  others  ;  but  it  was  never 
so  used.      Keo  means  to  pour ;  but  pouring  is  not 

1  "Essay  on  Baptism,"  p.  51  ;   "Biblical  Repository,"   1833, 
p.  298. 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  9/ 

baptism,  and  so  this  word  was  never  used  to  de- 
scribe the  ordinance.  Katharizo  means  to  purify^ 
but  is  not  used  for  the  ordinance.  The  facts  are 
clear  and  the  reasoning  conclusive."  ^ 

John  Calvin,  the  great  theologian,  scholar,  and 
commentator,  whom  Scaliger  pronounced  the  most 
learned  man  in  Europe,  says  :  "  From  the  words 
of  John  (3  :  23)  it  may  be  inferred  that  baptism 
was  administered  by  John  and  Christ,  \>y  plunging 
the  whole  body  under  water."  ^ 

Luther,  the  great  German  Reformer,  says  :  "The 
term  baptism  is  Greek  ;  in  Latin  it  may  be  trans- 
lated viersio ;  since  we  immerse  anything  into 
water,  that  the  whole  may  be  covered  with  the 
water."  ^ 

Melancthon,  the  most  scholarly  and  able  co- 
laborer  with  Luther,  says  :  "  Baptism  is  immersion 
into  water,  with  this  admirable  benediction."  ^ 

Adam  Clark,  the  great  Methodist  commentator, 
says  :  "  Alluding  to  the  immersions  practised  in  the 
case  of  adults,  wherein  the  person  appeared  to  be 
buried  under  the  water  as  Christ  was  buried  in  the 
heart  of  the  earth."  ^ 

Frederick  Meyer,  one  of  the  ablest  and  most 
accurate  exegetes  of  the  present  age,  says  :  ''Im- 
mersion, which  the  word  in  classic  Greek  and  in 
the  New  Testament  ever  means."  ® 


"The  Standard  Manual,"  p.  85.        "•'  Com.  on  John  3  :  23. 

'  "Works,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  71,  Wit.  ed.,  1582. 

*  Melanct.  "Catec.  Wit.,"  1580. 

5  Com.  on  Col.  2  :  12.  *  Cora,  on  Mark  7  :  4. 

G 


98       CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Dean  Alford  says  :  "The  baptism  was  adminis- 
tered   by  the    immersion   of  the  whole   person."  ^ 

Dr,  Schafif,  the  well-known  church  historian,  says  : 
"  Immersion,  and  not  sprinkling,  was  unquestion- 
ably the  original  form.  This  is  shown  by  the  very 
meaning  of  the  words  baptizo,  baptisma,  and  bap- 
tismos  used  to  designate  the  rite."^ 

Dean  Stanley,  the  distinguished  scholar  and  his- 
torian of  the  Oriental  church,  says  :  "The  practice 
of  the  Eastern  church  and  the  meaning  of  the 
word  leave  no  sufficient  ground  for  question  that 
the  original  form  of  baptism  was  complete  immer- 
sion in  the  deep  baptismal  waters."  ^ 

Prof  Fisher,  of  Yale  College,  the  accomplished 
scholar  and  historian,  says  of  the  apostolic  age  : 
"The  ordinary  mode  of  baptism  was  by  immer- 
sion.'" ^ 

John  Wesley,  the  celebrated  founder  of  Method- 
ism, says  :  "  Buried  with  him,  alluding  to  the  ancient 
manner  of  baptizing  hy  immersion^  ^ 

Neander  says  :  "  In  respect  to  the  form  of  bap- 
tism, it  was  in  conformity  to  the  original  institu- 
tion, and  the  original  import  of  the  symbol,  per- 
formed by  ijnmersion,  as  a  sign  of  entire  baptism 
into  the  Holy  Spirit,  of  being  Entirely  penetrated 
with  the  same."  * 

^  Greek  Testament,  Matt.  3  :  6. 
2  "Hist.  Apos.  Ch.,"  p.  488,  1851. 
^  "Hist.  Eastern  Church,"  p.  34. 

*  "  Hist.  Christ.  Ch.,"  p.  41.  ^  Note  on  Rom.  6  :  4. 

6  "Ch.  Hist.,"  Vol.  I.,  p.  310;  also  "Plant,  and  Train.,"  Vol. 
I.,  p.  222. 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAFflST  99 

Schaff  says:  "Finally,  so  far  as  it  respects  the 
mode  and  manner  of  outward  baptizing,  there  can 
be  no  doubt  that  immersion,  and  not  sprinkling,  was 
the  original  normal  form."^ 

Pressense  says  :  "  Baptism,  which  was  the  sign 
of  admission  into  the  church,  was  administered  by 
immcrsio7i.  The  convert  was  plunged  beneath  the 
water,  and  as  he  rose  from  it  he  received  the  lay- 
ing-on  of  hands."  ^ 

Kurtz  says  :  "  Baptism  took  place  by  a  complete 
immersion^  ^ 

In  regard  to  the  teaching  of  the  New  Testament 
touching  alike  the  subjects  and  the  act  of  baptism, 
the  scholars  of  the  world  are  practically  unanimous, 
The  way  that  infant  baptism  and  substitutes  for 
baptism  came  to  be  practised  is  easily  stated.  The 
idea  had  erroneously  arisen  that  no  one  could  be 
saved  without  baptism,  and  when  a  man  was  con- 
verted on  a  dying  bed  when  too  sick  to  be  bap- 
tized— that  is,  immersed — the  question  arose  as  to 
what  should  be  done.  The  idea  was  advanced 
that  in  such  a  case  of  necessity  it  would  suffice  to 
pour  water  on  him.  Thus  the  use  of  pouring 
and  sprinkling  came  in  with  the  unscriptural,  un- 
reasonable, and  dangerous  doctrine  that  baptism 
was  essential  to  salvation.  At  first  they  were  used 
only  in  cases  of  necessity.  In  the  Greek  Church 
immersion    is    still    the    standard   of  baptism.      It 

1  "Hist.  Christ.  Ch.,"  p.  488. 

*  "  Early  Years  of  Christianity,"  p.  374. 

"  "Ch    Hist.,"  p.  41. 


lOO    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

continued  such  in  the  Roman  CathoHc  Church  for 
over  a  thousand  years. 

Immersion  was  the  usage  in  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land down  to  the  time  of  the  Reformation,  and  is 
still  prescribed  in  the  Prayer  Book.  But  pouring 
and  sprinkling,  from  their  greater  convenience, 
came  to  be  used  more  and  more,  till  they  finally 
largely  supplanted  baptism.  But  their  use  would 
never  have  been  thought  of  but  for  the  superstitious 
and  abominable  idea  that  a  man's  soul  would  be 
lost  if  he  died  without  baptism.  Now  the  Baptist 
declares  that  baptism  is  not  necessary  to  salvation. 
He  thinks  a  Christian  should  be  baptized  ;  he 
thinks  a  Christian  who  can  obey  Christ  in  this  or- 
dinance and  refuses  to  be  obedient  may  imperil  his 
salvation,  but  he  does  not  think  it  is  a  thing  indis- 
pensable in  all  circumstances. 

Therefore  the  Baptist  says  that  if  a  Christian  can 
be  baptized  according  to  apostolic  usage  and  divine 
command,  he  should  be ;  but  if  a  man  is  converted 
on  a  dying  bed,  when  he  cannot  be  baptized, 
let  him  die  without  baptism.  If  a  man's  physical 
condition  makes  it  impossible  to  obey  the  com- 
mand, in  his  case  it  is  not  binding.  The  thief  on 
the  cross  could  not  obey  this  command  ;  still  Jesus 
promised  him  Paradise  that  very  day.  A  Baptist 
does  not  consider  that  he  is  ever  at  liberty  to  use  a 
human  substitute,  such  as  pouring  or  sprinkling, 
for  the  divine  command  of  baptism.  Not  consid- 
ering baptism  to  be  essential  to  salvation,  he  is  not 
troubled  at  the  idea  of  a  convert  dying  without 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  lOI 

baptism  when  it  is  not  possible  for  him  to  receive 
it. 

It  has  been  said  that  Baptists  make  too  much 
of  baptism  ;  but,  in  fact,  no  rehgious  body,  except 
the  Quakers,  makes  so  Httle  of  it  as  they.  And  the 
reason  why  they  do  not  practise  pouring  and  sprin- 
kling as  well  as  baptism  (immersion)  is  because  it 
does  not  trouble  them  in  the  least  to  let  a  convert 
who  cannot  yield  obedience  in  baptism  die  unbap- 
tized.  Their  adherence  to  baptism,  which  in  rare 
cases  cannot  be  administered,  shows  that  they  are 
not  in  the  least  "  ritualistic,"  but  have  very  low  ideas 
as  to  the  necessity  of  baptism.  They,  however,  re- 
gard Jesus  Christ  as  the  only  King  and  Lawgiver  in 
Zion,  and  his  word  as  the  sole  authority  in  all  mat- 
ters of  faith  and  practice,  and  so  they  observe  bap- 
tism as  he  commanded  and  as  the  apostles  practised 
and  taught.  And  now  this  Baptist  doctrine,  that 
baptism  is  not  necessary  to  salvation,  the  idea  that 
a  man's  soul  will  not  be  lost,  even  though  he  dies 
unbaptized,  is  a  doctrine  which  not  only  is  sup- 
ported by  the  Bible,  but  is  one  which  commands 
the  respect  of  men  outside  the  church.  The  Bap- 
tists are  not  medisevalists,  but  they  are  the  especial 
exponents  of  biblical  and  also  of  nineteeth  century 
ideas. 

RELIGIOUS    LIBERTY. 

Another  point  in  which  Baptists  are  the  expo- 
nents both  of  New  Testament  and  modern  ideas  is 
their  doctrine  of  religious  freedom — the  tenet  that 
the  civil  magistrate  has  no  authority  over  a  man's 


102    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

religious  creed  and  usage.  This  was  originally  a 
distinctively  Baptist  idea.  For  this  idea  they  have 
again  and  again  shed  their  blood.  It  is  not  long 
since  that  if  a  man  advanced  the  doctrine  of  re- 
ligious freedom  it  was  known  thereby  immediately 
that  he  was  a  Baptist.  Baptists  have  been  much 
praised  for  having  first  preached  this  great  doctrine, 
now  held  universally  in  our  own  country  and  in- 
creasingly in  other  lands  ;  but  this  doctrine  is 
merely  a  logical  deduction  from  the  fundamental 
Baptist  principle. 

In  the  Jewish  nation,  and  for  that  matter  in 
ancient  Gentile  nations,  as  for  instance  the  Roman 
Empire,  the  Church  and  the  State  were  one.  The 
Jewish  high  priest  was  a  civil  officer,  and  the 
Roman  emperor  was  Pontifex  Maximus.  The  civil 
and  the  ecclesiastical  governments  were  identical, 
or  at  least  organically  affiliated ,  and  of  course  the 
magistrate  had  authority  in  matters  of  religion. 
And  in  the  Middle  Ages  the  prevalence  of  the 
doctrine  of  baptismal  regeneration,  and  the  conse- 
quent nearly  universal  baptism  of  infants,  made 
every  child  not  only  a  citizen,  but  also  a  member 
of  the  church.  Thus  Church  and  State  became 
again  identical,  or  at  least  conterminous,  and  the 
civil  magistrate  became  the  servant  of  the  Church 
as  well  as  the  State. 

In  the  Middle  Ages,  when  there  was  a  full  ad- 
herence to  the  doctrine  of  baptismal  regeneration, 
and  of  the  spiritual  efficacy  of  the  mass  and  other 
ecclesiastical   ceremonies,  it  was  logical  to  believe 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  IO3 

that  the  civil  magistrate  could  make  persons  Chris- 
tians. If  baptizing  a  child  would  change  the  child's 
spiritual  state,  if  coming  to  mass  would  affect  a 
man's  spiritual  nature,  all  that  was  necessary  to 
make  a  nation  a  Christian  nation  was  to  enforce  by 
law  the  baptism  of  children,  attendance  at  mass, 
etc.  If  salvation  came  through  outward  ceremo- 
nies, the  observance  of  which  could  be  compelled 
by  force,  then  it  was  possible  to  compel  people  to 
become  Christians.  They  could  not  only  be  led  to 
the  water  of  life,  but  by  thumbscrew  and  fagot 
could  be  made  to  drink.  And  such  compulsion 
seemed  a  solemn  duty  to  those  who  believed  that 
the  non-observance  of  baptism  and  other  ceremo- 
nies left  the  soul  to  be  lost.  But  the  Baptist  doc- 
trine that  a  man  could  be  made  a  Christian  only 
by  the  free  action  of  his  own  spiritual  nature  left 
the  civil  magistrate  nothing  to  do.  This  doctrine 
implied  that  it  was  unreasonable  as  well  as  unjust 
to  strive  to  force  men  in  religious  matters. 

The  logical  development  of  Baptist  principles 
led  to  the  great  doctrine  of  religious  freedom.  A 
moment's  thought  will  show  that  there  is  no  ground 
for  saying  that  the  only  reason  why  Baptists  did 
not  persecute  as  did  others,  was  because  they  did 
not  have  the  power  so  to  do.  They  often  had  oc- 
casion to  speak  on  this  subject.  For  instance,  one 
Thomas  Van  Imwalt,  a  Baptist  confessor  in  the 
Tyrol,  when  examined  in  prison  was  asked  whether 
in  case  his  people  had  the  power  they  would  not 
force  their  doctrine  on  all  nations,  answered  :  "  No, 


104    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

that  it  would  be  foolish  for  them  to  endeavor  to 
bring  any  one  to  behef  by  force,  for  God  will  accept 
only  a  willing  and  unconstrained  heart."  They  saw 
that  while  a  man  might  by  force  be  brought  to 
baptism  and  the  Lord's  Supper,  he  could  not  by 
force  be  brought  to  believe.  As  they  believed  that 
it  was  not  baptism  and  other  ceremonies,  but  only 
unconstrained  belief  that  made  a  man  a  Christian, 
they  never  attempted  to  make  a  Christian  by  force 
even  when  they  had  the  power. 

But  the  Baptist  doctrine  that  baptizing  a  person 
would  not  make  him  a  Christian,  the  idea  that  one 
could  become  a  Christian  only  through  an  intelli- 
gent personal  faith  and  a  spiritual  change,  suggests 
immediately  a  separation  between  citizens  and 
church-members,  between  the  civil  community  and 
the  ecclesiastical  body.  The  Baptist  idea  made  the 
church  consist  not  of  citizens  altogether,  but  only  of 
a  separated  number.  Thus  the  church  became  in 
this  one  particular  like  a  Masonic  lodge,  a  group 
of  persons  apart  from  the  main  body  of  citizens,  and 
thus  Church  and  State  were  separated.  The  divorce 
between  Church  and  State  was  not  merely  a  lucky 
thought  of  certain  Baptist  philosophers  ;  it  was  the 
logical  outcome  of  distinctive  Baptist  principles. 
The  Baptists  preceded  other  Christians  in  declar- 
ing the  true  relation  of  the  civil  and  ecclesiastical 
powers,  not  because  they  were  superior  to  other 
Christians  in  their  understanding  of  civil  principles, 
but  because  they  held  an  ecclesiastical  tenet  which 
was  correct  while  other  churches  were  in  error. 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  IO5 

Others  might  abstain  from  persecution  because 
their  pity  was  stronger  than  their  creed,  but  Bap- 
tists refrained  from  attempting  to  force  men  to  be- 
come Christians  because  their  fundamental  principle 
was  that  it  was  impossible  to  do  this.  They  taught 
that  force  could  be  used  to  control  men's  outward 
actions  and  so  keep  them  from  injuring  their  fellow- 
men,  but  it  could  not  control  the  working  of  their 
hearts  so  as  to  make  them  true  Christians.  So  they 
taught  that  the  civil  magistrate  should  take  no  cog- 
nizance of  the  religious  beliefs  or  purely  religious 
practices  of  men,  whether  orthodox  or  heretic,  Turk 
or  heathen,  but  that  these  should  be  left  to  the 
judgment  of  God.  This  Baptist  doctrine  is  not 
only  New  Testament  doctrine  but  it  commands  the 
adherence  of  the  best  thought  of  modern  times. 
Baptists  of  to-day  are  justly  proud  of  their  ances- 
tors. They  were  among  the  noblest  men  and 
women  in  the  army  of  confessors  and  martyrs. 
They  anticipated  the  ripest  thought  of  to-day. 
They  never  persecuted,  but  were  always  and  every- 
where the  apostles  of  religious  freedom  and  soul 
liberty. 

SALVATION    OF    INFANTS. 

There  is  a  doctrine  now  held  by  all  intelligent 
Christians  which  formerly  was  set  forth  by  Baptists 
alone,  namely,  the  doctrine  of  the  salvation  of  all 
who  die  in  infancy.  It  is  only  in  very  recent  times 
that  this  doctrine  has  been  generally  held.  It  was 
not  very  long  ago  that  if  a  man  said  the  dying  in- 
fant of  a  heathen  or  Turk  was  saved,  all  who  heard 


I06    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

him  knew  at  once  that  he  was  a  Baptist.  But  this 
doctrine,  denied  by  others,  was  adopted  by  Baptists 
as  a  logical  outcome  of  their  fundamental  principle. 
The  doctrine  that  baptism  wrought  sah^ation  led  to 
the  so-called  baptism  of  infants  ;  infant  baptism 
would  never  have  been  thought  of  but  for  this  doc- 
trine of  baptismal  regeneration.  This  doctrine  is 
the  root  of  which  infant  baptism  is  the  fruit,  and  its 
story  is  one  of  the  most  fearful  the  student  of  his- 
tory anywhere  finds.  In  Lecky's  "  History  of  Ra- 
tionalism "  occur  the  following  burning  lines  : 

According  to  the  unanimous  belief  of  the  early  church, 
all  who  were  external  to  Christianity  were  doomed  to 
eternal  damnation,  and  therefore  even  the  new-born  in- 
fant was  subject  to  the  condemnation,  unless  baptism 
had  united  it  to  the  church.  At  a  period  which  is  so 
early  that  it  is  impossible  to  define  it,  infant  baptism  was 
introduced  into  the  church  ;  it  was  universally  said  to  be 
for  the  remission  of  sins,  and  the  whole  body  of  the  fathers, 
without  exception  or  hesitation,  pronounced  that  all  infants 
who  died  unbaptized  were  excluded  from  heaven.  All 
through  the  Middle  Ages  we  trace  the  influence  of  this  doc- 
trine in  the  innumerable  superstitious  rites  which  were  de- 
vised as  substitutes  for  regular  baptism.  Nothing,  indeed, 
can  be  more  curious,  nothing  can  be  more  deeply  pathetic, 
than  the  record  of  the  many  ways  by  which  the  terror- 
stricken  mothers  attempted  to  evade  the  awful  sentence  of 
their  church.  Sometimes  the  baptismal  water  was  sprinkled 
upon  the  womb  ;  sometimes  the  still-born  child  was  bap- 
tized in  hopes  that  the  Almighty  would  antedate  the  cere- 
mony. These  and  many  similar  practices  continued  all 
through  the  Middle  Ages  in  spite  of  every  effort  to  extirpate 
them,  and  the  severest  censures  were  unable  to  persuade 
the  people  that  they  were  entirely  effectual,  for  the  doctrine 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  lO/ 

of  the  church  had  wrung  the  mother' s  heart  with  an  agony 
that  was  too  poignant  even  for  that  submissive  age  to  bear. 
Weak  and  superstitious  women,  who  never  dreamed  of  re- 
belling against  the  teaching  of  their  clergy,  could  not  acqui- 
esce in  the  perdition  of  their  offspring,  and  they  vainly 
attempted  to  escape  from  the  dilemma  by  multiplying 
superstitious  practices  or  by  attributing  to  them  a  more 
than  orthodox  efficacy. 

To  illustrate  Mr.  Lecky's  remarks,  we  may  quote 
from  the  decrees  of  a  synod  at  Cologne  in  1280 
A.  D.  After  prescribing  immersion  as  the  only  reg- 
ular baptism  (as  it  was  in  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  for  more  than  a  thousand  years)  it  goes  on 
to  say :  "But  in  case  there  is  fear  that  an  infant  will 
die  before  it  is  born,  if  the  head  of  the  infant  .  .  . 
some  one  shall  pour  water  over  the  head  saying,  '  I 
baptize  thee,'  etc."  It  will  not  be  denied  that  the 
Caesarean  operation  has  often  been  performed  in 
Roman  Catholic  countries,  and  occasionally  in  other 
countries,  that  the  child  may  be  saved  by  baptism 
even  though  the  mother  should  die,  her  eternal 
safety  being  already  secured.  One  does  not  like 
to  refer  to  matters  of  this  delicate  nature  ;  but  it  is 
time  that  the  superstitions  and  barbarities  which 
are  thus  connected  with  infant  baptism  were  re- 
buked with  great  plainness  of  speech  as  unworthy 
even  of  the  most  degraded  heathen.  Some  have 
called  infant  baptism  a  beautiful  ceremony.  But, 
in  fact,  it  is  the  efflorescence  of  a  most  gross  super- 
stition, and  viewed  in  the  light  of  Church  history 
it  is  only  horrible  and  repulsive.  As  the  little  in- 
fant is  borne  in  its  gay  robes  down  the  aisle,  the 


I08    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

language  of  the  ceremonial  is  that  except  some 
drops  of  water  be  sprinkled  on  its  forehead  that 
beautiful  little  being  would  writhe  in  the  flames  of 
hell.  Who  dares,  even  in  symbol,  teach  so  horrible 
a  doctrine  ?  How  can  a  few  drops  of  water,  or  an 
ocean,  change  the  child's  relations  to  God  ?  In  any 
case,  the  child  has  no  more  penal  sin  than  a  rose  or 
a  snowflake. 

The  doctrine  that  all  dying  in  infancy  are  saved 
was  first  taught  by  the  Baptists.  They  held  that 
not  only  an  adult  believer  would  be  saved,  though 
he  died  without  baptism,  but  that  all  dying  in  in- 
fancy were  saved.  This  doctrine  continually  ap- 
pears in  the  charges  against  Baptists  who  were  put 
to  death  for  their  faith.  For  instance,  Henry  Craut, 
Justus  Mueller,  and  John  Peiskerwere  beheaded  at 
Jena,  in  1 536,  not  by  Roman  Catholics,  but  by  their 
Protestant  brethren,  the,  Lutherans.  Among  their 
announced  views  was  the  doctrine  that  "all  infants, 
even  those  of  Turks,  Gentiles,  and  Hebrews,  are 
saved  without  baptism."  The  first  time  this  doc- 
trine appears  in  a  non-Baptist  creed  it  is  mentioned 
only  to  be  condemned.  The  Augsburg  Confession 
of  1530  says  :  '' Damnaiit  Anabaptistas,  qui  ivipro- 
bant  baptismum  pueroriim  et  affivuiant  pucros  sine 
baptismo  salvos  fieri."  "They  [the  churches  putting 
forth  this  creed]  condemn  the  Anabaptists  [a  nick- 
name of  the  Baptists]  who  reject  the  baptism  of 
children  and  declare  that  children  are  saved  with- 
out baptism." 

Even  in  our  own  country  similar  opposition  was 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  IO9 

once  manifested  against  the  Baptist  faith.  When 
Clarke,  Holmes,  and  Crandall  were  imprisoned  and 
fined  in  Boston,  Mr.  Clarke,  when  standing  stripped 
at  the  whipping-post,  had  his  fine  paid  by  a  hu- 
mane man,  who  was  greatly  affected  by  the  sight 
of  a  scholar,  a  gentleman,  and  a  divine  in  such  a 
situation.  On  asking,  "What  law  of  God  or  men 
had  he  (Clarke)  broken?"  Endicott  replied  to 
Clarke  :  "You  have  denied  infant  baptism,  and  de- 
serve death."  Persecution  of  these  who  so  deny  is 
the  natural  result  of  the  belief  which  led  to  the 
practice  of  infant  baptism.  We  again  affirm  that  it 
is  a  practice  contrary  to  Scripture,  even  as  inter- 
preted by  non-Baptist  scholars,  and  also  to  the 
sound  reason  of  all  intelligent  men  who  are  not 
prejudiced  by  early  training  and  one-sided  edu- 
cation. 

SUMMARY. 

To  sum  up,  I  would  say  that  the  fundamental 
principle  of  the  Baptists,  and  one  formerly  held  by 
them  alone,  is  that  a  man's  salvation  depends  solely 
on  personal  faith  in  Christ  and  the  resultant  change 
of  inward  character,  and  not  on  baptism  and  other 
church  ordinances.  As  a  result,  they  affirm  that 
faith  must  be  personal ;  that  no  man  can  believe 
for  another,  no  parent  for  a  child  ;  and  that,  there- 
fore, the  church  is  not  made  up  of  "  believers  and 
their  children,"  except  so  far  as  the  children  are 
themselves  believers.  They  hold  that  any  other 
view  of  the  church  is  without  the  authority  of 
Scripture  or  common  sense.     They  administer  bap- 


no    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tism  only  to  those  who  profess  faith  in  Christ  and 
give  evidence  in  daily  life  of  having  been  converted. 
They  administer  immersion,  the  act  of  baptism  in 
the  apostolic  church,  and  when  this  is  impracticable 
they  let  the  convert  die  without  baptism.  Holding 
that  a  man  is  not  made  a  Christian  by  baptism  and 
other  outward  acts,  but  only  by  a  change  in  his 
spiritual  nature,  which  cannot  be  brought  out  by 
force,  they  therefore  insist  that  no  outward  force  or 
form  shall  be  used  to  make  men  Christians,  and 
that  the  civil  magistrate  shall  confine  himself  en- 
tirely to  civil  affairs,  not  interfering  in  purely 
religious  matters.  Holding  that  baptism  is  not  nec- 
essary to  salvation,  they  hold  that  not  only  believing 
adults,  but  also  all  who  die  in  infancy,  even  heathen 
children,  are  saved. 

These  ideas,  which  not  very  long  ago  were  held 
by  Baptists  alone,  are  now  held  by  the  most  en- 
lightened men  outside  the  Baptist  ranks,  and  I 
consider  them  also  the  teachings  of  the  New 
Testament.  This  is  another  reason  "why  I  am  a 
Baptist." 

If  I  take  the  Bible  only  as  my  guide,  I  must  be 
a  Baptist ;  if  I  discard  it,  and  take  the  traditions  of 
men,  I  could  not  consistently  stop  until  I  had 
reached  Rome.  But  I  am  not  likely  to  start  on 
that  downward  grade.  If  I  were  not  a  Baptist, 
logically  I  should  have  to  be  a  Roman  Catholic. 
The  Catholics  are  perfectly  consistent,  but  unscrip- 
tural ;  grant  their  premises,  and  logically  you  must 
adopt   their    conclusions.     The    Baptists    are    also 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  I  I  I 

consistent  and  at  the  same  time  scriptural  ;  grant 
the  Baptist  premise,  and  you  must  accept  the  Bap- 
tist conclusion.  But  the  Congregationalists,  the 
Methodists,  the  Presbyterians,  and  the  Episcopa- 
lians are  not  consistent.  Their  position  is  half-Ro- 
manist, half-Baptist.  They  have  no  logical  stand- 
ing-ground. There  are  but  two  consistent  and 
logical  positions,  one  of  which  is  held  by  the  Ro- 
manists and  the  other  by  the  Baptists.  Every 
consistent,  logical,  and  unprejudiced  thinker  w'Al 
take  one  or  the  other.  Here  on  the  word  of  God, 
Baptists  stand  ;  they  are  consistent  Protestants ; 
they  antedate  existing  denominational  divisions ; 
they  are  truly  apostolic.  Baptism  is  the  catholic 
and  apostolic  ordinance.  Their  position  is  impreg- 
nable. Historically,  Baptists  are  not  Protestants  ; 
doctrinally,  they  are  the  most  consistent  Protes- 
tants. While  the  Bible  stands  they  shall  stand,  and 
the  "word  of  God  shall  stand  forever."  God  has 
given  them  wonderful  prosperity.  They  are  in- 
creasing in  the  United  States  to-day  much  faster 
than  the  population  of  this  the  most  rapidly  popu- 
lating country  in  the  world  ;  they  are  in  sympathy 
with  all  progressive  American  ideas,  and  at  the 
same  time  are  loyal  to  the  word  of  God.  They 
love  their  brethren  of  all  denominations  ;  they  are 
ready  to  unite  with  them  in  all  forms  of  Christian 
activity.  They  use  constantly  the  Master's  prayer 
for  his  disciples — "  that  they  all  may  be  one,  as 
thou,  Father,  art  in  me  and  I  in  thee,  that  they 
may  also  be  one  in  us." 


112    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

If  ever  there  is  organic  unity,  it  will  begin  at 
the  baptistery.  Every  denomination  in  Protestant 
Christendom  and  in  the  entire  Roman  and  Greek 
Churches  can  agree  upon  baptism,  that  is,  immer- 
sion, as  taught  by  our  Lord  and  his  apostles.  The 
Greek  Church,  numbering  quite  ninety  million  ad- 
herents, has  ever  been  a  stout  witness  on  behalf  of 
baptism.  The  Roman  Church  joyfully  accepts  it, 
and  all  the  Protestant  churches  join  hands  with 
these  two  great  bodies.  On  no  substitute  for  bap- 
tism can  all  the  denominations  agree.  We  are  not 
now  arguing  a  point ;  we  are  simply  stating  an  in- 
controvertible fact.  Do  men  really  want  organic 
Christian  union  ?  Are  they  in  earnest  when  they 
proclaim  this  desire  ?  Are  they  willing  to  follow 
Christ  into  the  waters  of  baptism  ?  Are  they  will- 
ing to  join  hands  with  their  brethren  in  all  centuries 
and  in  all  climes  ?  Here  is  the  opportunity  ;  here 
is  the  truly  apostolic  and  catholic  ordinance.  As- 
suming for  the  moment  that  Christ  and  his  apostles 
intended  to  teach  the  two-fold  idea  that  believers 
are  the  true  subjects  and  immersion  is  the  act  of 
baptism,  could  they  have  chosen  language  which 
would  more  fittingly  express  this  two-fold  idea  than 
the  words  they  employ?  If  their  words  do  not 
teach  these  truths  can  the  Greek  tongue,  the  most 
exact  of  all  languages,  teach  these  truths  ?  Those 
are  fair  questions  ;  and  to  them  candor  compels  us 
to  reply  that  the  language  of  Christ  and  his  apostles 
is  unmistakable  in  its  meaning.  That  it  could  ever 
have  been  misunderstood  is  well-nigh  incredible. 


REASONS    FOR    BEING    A    BAPTIST  II3 

If  they  will  but  follow  apostolic  injunction  and 
example  then  all  can  say,  "  We  are  buried  with 
him  by  baptism  unto  death."  And  then  there  may 
be,  if  it  is  desired,  organic  union  without  doing 
violence  to  the  convictions  of  any,  and  in  acknowl- 
edged harmony  with  the  word  of  God  and  its  rec- 
ognized interpretations.  On  but  few  points  is  the 
scholarship  of  the  world  so  nearly  a  unit  as  it  is  in 
regard  to  the  meaning  of  the  word  "baptism,"  and 
as  to  the  practice  of  the  apostles  and  the  early 
church.  It  would  be  easy  to  fill  pages  with  the 
names  of  learned  authorities  on  all  these  points, 
and  the  simple-minded  disciple  of  the  Lord  Jesus, 
with  no  guide  but  the  New  Testament,  comes  to 
the  same  conclusion.  May  the  Holy  Spirit  lead  all 
believers  into  all  truth  ! 


H 


V 
BAPTIST  POLITY  AND  HISTORIC  CREEDS ' 

THE  polity  of  all  the  denominations  has  been 
severely  tested  within  the  past  few  years. 
The  Presbyterian  Church  has  been  greatly  agitated 
over  the  ecclesiastical  trials  of  Professor  Briggs  and 
Professor  Smith ;  the  Episcopal  Church  has  passed 
through  somewhat  similar  experiences,  and  has 
had  to  exclude  some  of  its  clergy  from  its  fellow- 
ship. Occasionally  Baptist  brethren  wish  that  our 
polity  was  more  mechanical,  formal,  and  authorita- 
tive. So  soon  as  any  ecclesiastical  difficulty  arises 
among  us,  these  brethren  express  their  sympathy 
with  the  polity  of  some  other  churches,  and  their 
dissatisfaction  with  that  of  our  own  denomination. 

But  recent  events  have  more  than  justified  the 
practical  wisdom  and  confirmed  the  scriptural 
authority  of  our  prevailing  polity.  It  is  utterly 
impossible  that  trials  like  those  of  Professor  Briggs 
and  Professor  Smith  could  arise  in  the  Baptist  de- 
nomination. There  is  no  church  to-day  in  which 
the  law  of  moral  affinity  is  so  constantly  and  com- 
pletely manifested  as  in  the  Baptist  churches  of 
America.      Men  among  us  who  are  not  of  us  go 

^  Delivered  before  the  Young  Men's   BajUist  Social  Union  of 
Boston,  March,  1896. 
114 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       I  I  5 

out  from  us,  in  harmony  with  the  law  of  moral  and 
spiritual  gravitation.  This  fact  is  one  of  the  inter- 
esting features  of  our  denominational  life.  The 
bond  which  holds  us  together  as  members  and  as 
churches  is  often  said  to  be  as  weak  as  a  rope  of 
sand  ;  but  it  is  not  a  mere  paradox  to  say  that  its 
acknowledged  weakness  is  a  marked  element  of  its 
inherent  strength. 

We  have  no  creed  in  the  technical  sense  of 
that  term ;  but  we  are  more  a  unit  to-day  in  faith 
and  practice  than  any  other  religious  body  in  the 
United  States.  We  are  held  together  by  loyalty 
to  the  word  of  God  as  the  rule  of  our  faith  and 
practice ;  and  as  a  matter  of  fact  we  find  it  easier 
to  understand  the  divine  teachings  as  recorded 
in  the  divine  word,  than  to  interpret  the  creeds 
which  are  supposed  to  set  forth  the  divine  teach- 
ing. The  unwritten  British  constitution  has  proved 
to  be  as  binding  as  any  written  document  expres- 
sive of  a  nation's  fealty  to  history,  to  law,  and  to 
authority.  In  like  manner  the  unwritten  creed  of 
the  Baptist  churches  is  expressive,  forceful,  under- 
standable, and  authoritative  to  a  remarkable  de- 
gree. 

Not  long  ago,  in  a  company  of  pastors  and 
other  clerg}'men  representing  all  the  leading  Prot- 
estant denominations,  a  clergyman  of  the  Protest- 
ant Episcopal  Church  used  these  words :  "In  one 
sense  Baptists  have  no  creed ;  but  in  another  sense 
they  have  a  stronger  creed  than  that  of  any  one  of 
our  churches ;  he  [the  Baptist]  then  [in  the  bap- 


Il6    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tistery]  virtually  announces  his  creed  touching  his 
personal  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  as  Saviour  and  Lord, 
and  his  determination  to  follow  him  in  obedience 
to  the  teachings  of  the  gospel.  He  then  submits 
to  the  act  of  baptism.  This  act  is  in  itself  the 
most  expressive  and  beautiful  of  all  creeds ;  it  sets 
forth  a  death  to  sin,  a  burial  as  thus  dead,  and  a 
resurrection  as  thus  made  alive  in  Christ  and 
promising  to  walk  in  newness  of  life."  This  gen- 
tleman then  added  with  the  utmost  emphasis  : 
"Would  to  God  that  the  Anglican  and  Episco- 
pal Churches  had  never  departed  from  the  prim- 
itive and  apostolic  baptism,  and  if  they  are  wise 
they  will  return  to  its  observance  at  the  earliest 
possible  day."  He  gave  me  liberty  to  quote  his 
words,  else  I  should  not  so  do  in  this  address. 

The  time  is  speedily  coming  when  no  denomi- 
nation making  any  pretense  to  be  abreast  of  the 
thought  of  the  day  will  fail  to  have  a  baptistery  in 
all  its  churches.  It  is  affirmed  that  Dr.  Henry  C. 
Potter,  bishop  of  the  Episcopal  churches  in  New 
York  City,  has  determined  to  put  a  baptistery'  into 
the  Cathedral  of  St.  John  the  Divine,  now  in  course 
of  erection.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that  in  a 
quarter  of  a  century  a  church  without  a  baptistery 
will  be  an  exception  to  the  rule  of  churches  in  all 
denominations.  Baptism  is  the  great  apostolic  and 
catholic  ordinance.  No  scholar  of  any  reputation 
will  oppose  this  statement.  It  is  astonishing  that 
churches  of  so  many  denominations  have  so  long 
been  governed  by  prejudice,  tradition,  and  super- 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       11/ 

stition,  rather  than  by  the  simple,  beautiful,  and 
authoritative  teaching  and  example  of  Christ  and 
his  apostles.  No  church  can  rightly  claim  to  be 
Protestant  while  practising  infant  baptism.  This 
rite  has  no  authority  in  the  New  Testament ;  and 
Protestant  churches  which  practise  this  relic  of  Ro- 
manism have  in  so  far  ceased  to  be  Protestant,  and 
have  gone  over  to  the  ground  of  the  Romanist. 

CHURCH    UNITY. 

Church  unity,  even  if  it  were  desirable,  will  never 
be  secured  by  insistence  on  the  authority  of  the 
historic  creeds.  The  more  we  know  of  the  manner 
in  which  these  creeds  were  formulated,  the  less 
authority  can  we  attach  to  their  teaching.  They 
often  obscure  the  truth  which  they  are  supposed 
plainly  to  declare ;  they  are  often  far  more  difficult 
of  comprehension  than  are  the  Scriptures  on  which 
the  creeds  are  supposed  to  be  based. 

THE    apostles'    CREED. 

The  so-called  Apostles'  Creed  is  an  early  sum- 
mary of  the  Christian  faith,  with  most  of  whose 
statements  most  of  us  are  heartily  agreed.  We 
fully  appreciate  the  high  praise  which  Augustine 
gives  it  when  he  says  regarding  it,  "  Regula  fidei 
brevis  et  grandis  ;  brevis  numero  verborian,  grandis 
ponder e  sententiarumr  It  is  to  be  highly  esteemed 
as  a  compendium  of  doctrine,  for  its  intrinsic  worth, 
and  for  the  veneration  in  which  it  has  been  so  long 
and  so  deservedly  held  by  many  bodies  of  Chris- 


Il8    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tians.  One  can  almost  agree  with  Dr.  Schaff  when 
he  says  that  though  it  is  "  not  in  form  the  produc- 
tion of  the  apostles,  it  is  a  faithful  compend  of 
their  doctrines,  and  comprehends  the  leading  arti- 
cles of  the  faith  in  the  Triune  God  and  his  revela- 
tion, from  the  creation  to  the  life  everlasting,  in 
sublime  simplicity,  in  unsurpassable  brevity,  in  the 
most  beautiful  order,  and  with  liturgical  solemnity ; 
and  to  this  day  it  is  the  common  bond  of  Greek, 
Roman,  and  evangelical  Christendom." 

We  object,  however,  to  its  title.  It  is  not,  in  any 
natural  sense  of  the  word,  the  Apostles'  Creed ;  it 
never  ought  to  have  been  called  by  this  name.  This 
title  is  an  example  of  what  has  been  called  "a  pious 
fraud."  All  investigators  now  heartily  agree  that 
the  so-called  Athanasian  Creed  was  not  the  work  of 
the  famous  Athanasius,  although  it  bears  his  name. 
Dr.  Swainson  does  not  hesitate  to  ascribe  the  origin 
of  this  title  to  a  deliberate  purpose  to  practise  an 
imposition.  He  classified  this  purpose  with  that 
which  led  to  the  "  False  Decretals,"  and  the  "  Dona- 
tion of  Constantine."  So  we  may  say  of  the  name 
of  this  other  creed.  The  apostles  never  saw  the 
creed  to  which  their  name  is  attached  ;  they  never 
heard  of  it,  and  perhaps  would  not  be  willing  to  en- 
dorse it  in  all  its  parts  as  we  now  have  it.  It  may  be 
said  that  the  title  is  now  used  with  the  understand- 
ing that  it  is  simply  a  truthful  compend  of  apostolic 
doctrine ;  that  it  sets  forth  apostolic  principles  of 
faith  in  God  and  in  his  revelation. 

But  the  title  was  intended  to  convey  quite  a  dif- 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       II 9 

ferent  meaning;  it  was  intended  to  convey  the  idea, 
which  the  Roman  Church  now  clearly  teaches,  that 
its  clauses  were  actually  contributed  by  the  apostles. 
This  church,  under  the  authority  of  a  writer  under 
the  name  of  Augustine,  undertakes  to  name  the 
clauses  given  by  the  different  apostles.  To  the  his- 
torical compiler  and  traditionalist  Rufinus,  of  the 
fourth  century,  we  are  indebted  for  the  earliest  ac- 
counts of  the  origin  of  this  creed.  He  affirmed 
that  the  apostles,  before  separating  to  the  different 
nations,  agreed  upon  "a  form  of  sound  words,"  and 
that  when  met  together  they  composed  this  com- 
pend  under  the  special  influence  of  the  Holy  Ghost. 
He  gives  his  authority  from  some  writer  named 
Augustine.  Some  suppose  him  to  be  St.  Augus- 
tine, and  it  is  claimed  that  the  legend  is  found  in 
the  appendix  to  his  work  ;  but  careful  historic  in- 
quiry shows  that  it  is  based  on  two  discourses  spu- 
riously attributed  to  him.  He  pretends  to  tell  us 
what  article  was  contributed  by  each  apostle.  He 
thus  affirms,  ^^ Pctrus  dixit,  Credo  in  Deuin  Patrein 
oninipotentcni.  JoJiamies  dixit,  Creatoreni  cceli  et 
terrcsy  James,  "and  in  Jesus  Christ  his  only  Son 
our  Lord"  ;  Andrew,  "who  was  conceived  by  the 
Holy  Ghost,  born  of  the  Virgin  Mary"  ;  and  so  to 
Philip,  Thomas,  Bartholomew,  Matthew,  and  others, 
various  parts  of  this  creed  are  assigned. 

But  no  careful  historic  student  attaches  impor- 
tance to-day  to  this  testimony  of  Rufinus.  We  know 
that  neither  the  Evangelist  Luke  in  the  Acts  of  the 
Apostles,  nor  any  ecclesiastical  writer  before  the 


120    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

fifth  century  makes  mention  of  any  assembly  of  the 
Apostles  for  the  purpose  of  forming  a  creed  of  any 
sort.  We  know  also  that  none  of  the  Fathers  of 
the  first  three  centuries,  although  often  engaged  in 
disputes  with  various  heretics,  ever  endeavored  to 
support  their  doctrines  by  referring  to  the  creed 
prepared  and  promulgated  by  the  apostles.  Not 
one  of  these  Fathers  ever  pretended  that  the  apos- 
tles composed  this  creed.  We  may  be  sure  that  if 
they  so  believed  they  would  have  so  affirmed  and 
this  creed  would  have  been  taught  in  all  the 
churches  from  the  earliest  ages.  There  were  parts 
of  creeds  extant  in  the  fourth  century,  but  they 
differed  considerably  among  themselves,  and  also 
from  this  so-called  Apostles'  Creed.  We  can  read- 
ily understand  that  parts  of  creeds  would  grow  up 
in  an  early  age  in  the  history  of  the  church. 
When  the  Apostle  Peter  answered  the  question  of 
Christ,  "Whom  do  men  say  that  I  am?"  with  the 
words,  "Thou  art  the  Christ,"  he  gave  one  article 
of  a  creed.  The  baptismal  formula  contains  sug- 
gestions which  could  readily  be  expanded  into 
creedal  statements.  We  also  have  a  suggestion  of 
a  definite  summary  of  belief  in  2  Tim.  i  :  3,  where 
reference  is  made  to  a  "form  of  sound  words"  ; 
also  in  the  expression  "faithful  saying."  But  no 
attempt  was  made  in  the  early  centuries  to  prepare 
a  complete  compend  of  doctrine  as  an  authoritative 
creed. 

We  know  also  that  the  so-called  Apostles'  Creed 
was  not  admitted  at  an  early  age  into  the  liturgy, 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       121 

although  candidates  for  baptism  may  have  been  re- 
quired to  subscribe  to  parts  of  it.  It  first  ap- 
peared in  public  worship  as  instituted  in  the  Greek 
Church  at  Antioch.  It  does  not  seem  to  have  been 
introduced  in  the  Roman  Church  until  the  eleventh 
century ;  and  from  the  Roman  Church  it  passed 
into  the  Church  of  England  at  the  time  of  the  Ref- 
ormation. The  Westminster  divines  added  it,  with 
the  Lord's  Prayer  and  the  Ten  Commandments,  to 
their  catechism  ;  but  distinctly  explained  in  a  note, 
that  it  was  simply  a  brief  summary  of  the  Chris- 
tian faith  agreeable  to  the  word  of  God.  The 
most  that  can  be  claimed  for  the  title,  Apostles' 
Creed,  is  that  it  fairly  represents  the  facts  of  Chris- 
tian faith  as  taught  by  the  apostles. 

We  also  know  well  that  the  clauses  relating  to  the 
descent  into  hell  and  to  the  communion  of  saints 
are  of  later  origin  than  are  other  portions  of  the 
creed.  It  may  be  affirmed  that  the  so-called  Apos- 
tles' Creed  was  substantially  in  existence  from  the 
end  of  the  fourth  century  ;  but  in  its  completed  form 
it  cannot  be  traced  to  a  period  earlier  than  about 
the  middle  of  the  eighth  century.  If  this  state- 
ment is  correct,  then  it  is  about  four  centuries 
later  in  its  present  form  than  the  earlier  forms  of 
the  Nicene  Creed.  The  clause,  "  He  descended 
into  hell,"  is  one  whose  origin  is  involved  in  great 
doubt,  and  whose  teachings  are  not  accepted  by 
many  devout  believers  and  profound  scholars. 
We  know  that  an  alternative  form  is  suggested,  and 
if  that  form  were  universally  adopted,  fewer  criti- 


122    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

cisms  would  be  pronounced  upon  this  ancient  and 
confessedly  beautiful  compend  of  doctrine.  But 
it  would  be  much  better  to  omit  this  objectionable 
clause.  It  adds  nothing  valuable  to  the  thoughts 
expressed  by  the  associated  clauses.  It  is  quite 
unnecessary  to  state — especially  as  the  Scripture  is 
doubtful  on  the  point — where  our  Lord  was  be- 
tween his  crucifixion  and  resurrection. 

Thus  a  few  changes  and  omissions  would  greatly 
add  to  the  value  of  this  creed  for  popular  use,  and 
such  changes  have,  in  some  publications,  been 
made.  Men  to-day  are  quite  as  competent  to 
make  changes  as  were  those  who  made  other 
changes  through  several  centuries.  We  can  do 
our  thinking  to-day  quite  as  well  as  other  men 
who  did  theirs  in  their  day.  Each  age  must  do  its 
own  thinking.  The  tendency  is  to  give  the  truths 
taught  by  Christ  precise  dogmatic  statements. 
Formulations  of  Christian  doctrine  are  the  ex- 
pression of  the  Christian  consciousness  and  rea- 
son of  different  periods.  This  fact  makes  a  judi- 
cious study  of  creeds  peculiarly  valuable.  The 
early  object  of  the  creeds  was  to  distinguish  be- 
tween Christians  on  the  one  hand  and  Jews  and 
Pagans  on  the  other  ;  but  no  creed  ought  ever  to 
be  the  rule  of  faith.  That  position  and  authority 
belong  to  the  Bible  alone. 

THE    NICENE    CREED. 

To  the  Nicene  Creed  more  serious  objection  may 
be  offered.      The  circumstances  of  its  origin  tend 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       1 23 

greatly  to  lessen  the  authority  of  its  statements. 
We  know  that  the  controversies  regarding  the  per- 
son and  work  of  Christ,  which  began  in  the  second 
century,  were  prolonged  into  the  third  and  fourth 
centuries  under  various  phases  of  belief  and  state- 
ment. Ebionitism  affirmed  that  Christ  was  merely 
a  Jewish  teacher  of  ability  and  worth  ;  and  Theo- 
dotus  openly  taught  this  doctrine  in  Rome  near  the 
close  of  the  second  century.  Others  so  identified 
Christ  with  the  Godhead  as  to  destroy  his  person- 
ality. Paul  of  Samosata  reduced  Christ  to  the  level 
of  a  mere  man ;  and  Sabellius,  recognizing  the 
divinity  of  Christ,  made  him  merely  a  manifestation 
of  the  Father.  Arius  grew  up  in  the  midst  of  these 
controversies.  He  became  a  presbyter  of  Alex- 
andria. He  believed  that  Christ,  although  in  some 
sense  divine,  was  not  truly  God.  Then  Athanasius 
came  forward  as  his  opponent,  and  as  the  champion 
of  orthodoxy.  This  creed  thus  sprang  out  of  the 
heart  of  this  long  and  troublous  conflict ;  it  was 
literally  a  compromise,  and  it  is  to  be  received  only 
as  such. 

In  the  council  held  in  325  at  Nicaea,  sum- 
moned by  Constantine,  there  were  three  distinct 
parties — the  Athanasian,  the  Eusebian,  and  the 
Arian.  The  Arian,  or  heretical  party,  was  com- 
paratively few  in  numbers,  and  Arius  being  only  a 
presbyter  had  no  seat  in  the  conclave  ;  its  direct 
influence  was  not  great  at  any  time  in  the  council, 
but  its  indirect  influence  through  the  Eusebian  or 
middle  party  was  marked  at  every  stage  of  the  dis- 


124    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

cussion.  For  a  time  this  middle  party  was  able  to 
hold  the  orthodox,  or  Athanasian  party,  with  a  firm 
grasp.  The  chief  purpose  of  Constantine  in  calling 
this  council  was  to  establish  throughout  his  domin- 
ions unity  in  forms  of  faith  and  worship.  There  is 
no  detailed  report  of  its  proceedings,  although  both 
Eusebius  and  Athanasius  wrote  accounts  of  it. 
Dean  Stanley  says,  "We  know  not  whether  it  lasted 
weeks  or  days."  The  Confession  produced  by 
Eusebius  of  Caesarea,  as  that  of  the  church  of  Pales- 
tine, was  favored  by  Constantine,  and  was  acceptable 
to  the  Arians ;  but  this  latter  fact  led  the  orthodox 
to  oppose  it.  The  expressions,  Homooiisioji,  the  same 
nature  or  substance,  and  Homoiousion,  of  like  na- 
ture or  substance,  became  the  battleground  between 
the  parties.  The  Arians  violently  condemned  the 
first  term.  But  the  assent  of  the  emperor  was 
gained,  and  Hosius  of  Cordova  announced  the  creed 
of  the  church  as  settled. 

We  all  admit  that  there  was  much  that  was 
grand  and  imposing  in  the  Nicene  Council.  No 
church  council  so  imposing  had  met  previous  to 
that  time,  and  perhaps  few  of  like  character  have 
met  since.  But  we  know  also  that  at  times  this 
council  conducted  itself  in  a  manner  altogether 
unbecoming  a  solemn  assembly  of  Christian  men 
met  for  a  high  and  holy  purpose.  Drafts  of  creeds 
were  torn  in  pieces  by  the  excited  assembly,  and 
the  "lord  of  misrule"  reigned  occasionally  with 
uninterrupted  sway.  The  council  was  at  times 
more  like  a  ward  caucus  of  average  politicians  than 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       1 25 

like  a  council  of  grave  and  reverent  men.  Even 
the  presence  of  soldiers  as  police  officers  could  not 
prevent  shameful  outbreaks. 

It  is  also  true  that  the  Nicene  Creed  does  not 
now  appear  in  its  original  form,  and  the  history  of 
many  of  its  later  clauses  is  involved  in  great  obscu- 
rity. Whether  they  are  to  be  attributed  to  the 
Nicaeno-Constantinopolitan  Council  is  not  generally 
known  even  by  the  most  careful  investigators.  Some 
affirm  that  the  enlarged  creed  appears  in  a  work 
written  before  the  meeting  of  this  latter  council. 
The  exact  facts  probably  never  will  be  known.  It 
must  be  admitted  also  that  these  creeds  are  not  to 
any  degree  conservators  of  doctrine  ;  they  are  often 
divisive  rather  than  unitive.  The  Nicene  Creed  did 
not  stop  the  sway  of  Arianism  even  at  the  time ;  it 
magnified,  and  in  a  certain  sense  dignified,  Arian- 
ism, and  led,  for  a  time  at  least,  to  its  more  rapid 
spread.  Creeds  are  not  conservative  of  doctrine 
in  England  or  in  America  to-day.  The  churches 
whose  creeds  are  longest  and  strongest  differ  more 
among  themselves  as  to  their  faith  and  practice  than 
do  churches  in  which  there  is  no  creed,  in  the  tech- 
nical sense  of  that  term.  This  is  not  the  expression 
of  an  opinion ;  it  is  not  the  formulation  of  an  argu- 
ment ;  it  is  simply  the  statement  of  a  historic  fact. 

The  Nicene  Creed,  moreover,  is  in  some  of  its 
parts  too  abstruse,  too  metaphysical  and  philo- 
sophical for  general  adoption.  It  is  difificult  for 
any  man  to  give  a  clear  interpretation  of  some  of 
its  expressions.     There  may  be  doubt  as  to  whether 


126    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

the  forms  in  which  it  appears  in  EngHsh  properly 
represent  the  thought  of  the  original ;  but  the  inter- 
pretation, after  a  true  translation  has  been  made,  is 
much  more  difficult  than  the  translation  itself  It 
would  puzzle  any  teacher  of  religion  to  make  an 
explanatory  statement  of  some  clauses  in  this  creed 
which  would  be  intelligible  to  the  minds  of  immature 
thinkers  and  inexperienced  believers,  or  even  to 
those  of  maturity  and  experience.  That  creeds 
have  their  use  we  do  not  for  a  moment  deny ;  but 
that  they  should  be  thrust  between  the  Christian 
and  his  Bible  we  do  not  for  a  moment  believe. 

Whatever  tends  to  dethrone  or  even  to  disparage 
the  word  of  God,  is  so  far  to  be  rejected.  We  are 
unable  to  see  the  advantage  of  emphasizing  the 
value  of  elaborate  creeds.  We  cannot  discover 
their  practical  use  in  Christian  life  and  work,  and 
we  know  that  in  many  instances  they  have  divided 
the  church,  when  a  simpler  statement  of  God's 
word  would  have  united  God's  people.  It  is  often 
much  more  difficult,  as  already  suggested,  to  inter- 
pret the  creeds  than  to  interpret  the  Scriptures  on 
which  their  statements  are  supposed  to  be  based. 
The  Nicene  Creed  did  not  settle  the  contradictory 
opinions  in  the  church  at  that  time.  Especially 
was  the  doctrine  of  the  person  of  Christ  immedi- 
ately disputed  by  the  Arians,  the  semi-Arians,  and 
Eusebians.  There  was  also  difference  of  opinion  as 
to  whether  or  not  the  Holy  Spirit  was  created  by 
the  Father.  Several  synods  met,  but  failed  to  agree 
upon  any  statement  regarding  these  and  other  mat- 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       12/ 

ters.  The  result  was  that  certain  additions  to  the 
Nicene  Creed  were  adopted  at  the  second  Ecu- 
menical Council  at  Constantinople,  a.  d.  381.  Not 
until  the  fifth  century  were  the  words,  "and  from 
the  Son  "  {Filioqiic)  added.  The  Filioque  clause 
was  adopted  by  the  Western  churches  at  the  coun- 
cil of  Toledo  in  the  year  589  ;  but  this  creed  has 
remained  without  this  clause  as  the  ecumenical 
creed  of  the  Eastern  Church.  The  fact  is,  in  pro- 
portion as  creeds  become  inclusive  they  also  become 
exclusive.  They  are,  therefore,  as  was  said  before, 
divisive  rather  than  unitive. 

THE    ATHANASIAN    CREED. 

The  so-called  Athanasian  Creed,  or  the  Syinbobim 
Quicunque,  as  it  is  often  called,  is  known  as  one  of 
the  three  great  creeds  of  the  church  ;  but  no  intel- 
ligent student  now  supposes  that  it  was  prepared 
by  Athanasius,  the  famous  Father  of  the  fourth  cen- 
tury, whose  name  it  bears.  He  himself  nowhere 
mentions  it  in  any  of  the  older  MSS.  of  his  works  ; 
neither  do  any  of  his  contemporaries,  or  writers  im- 
mediately following  him.  A  careful  examination 
of  its  contents  shows  that  it  could  not  have  been 
written  by  him,  as  it  omits  points  which  were  vital 
in  his  time.  He  certainly  would  not  have  omitted 
the  word  "  Homoousion,"  consubstantial,  which  in 
his  day  marked  the  distinction  between  the  Atha- 
nasians  and  the  Arians ;  but  this  word  nowhere  ap- 
pears in  the  creed,  an  inexplicable  omission  in  a 
creed   composed   by  him.      Furthermore,    it   is   in 


128    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Latin,  as  its  original  language,  and  Athanasius  wrote 
in  Greek.  It  is  entirely  unknown  in  the  Greek 
Church  until  about  the  year  looo.  Late  in  the 
sixth  or  early  in  the  seventh  century  this  creed  be- 
came the  subject  of  general  comment ;  but  not 
until  still  later  did  it  acquire  the  title  Athanasian. 
Its  existence,  even  in  the  Latin  Church,  is  doubtful 
before  the  end  of  the  eighth  or  the  beginning  of 
the  ninth  century.  This  title  probably  was  given 
it  during  the  Arian  controversies  in  Gaul,  as  this 
creed  was  supposed  to  express  the  views  of  Atha- 
nasius. 

We  do  not  know  who  was  its  author ;  probably 
its  authorship  will  never  be  known.  It  has  been 
attributed  to  many  men  in  many  countries,  but  no 
authoritative  statement  can  be  made.  Prominent 
men  of  the  Church  of  England,  while  adopting 
the  creed  as  a  whole,  strongly  disapprove  of  its 
damnatory  clauses.  These  clauses  are  quite  shock- 
ing in  their  severity  and  assumption ;  indeed,  they 
are  little  less  than  blasphemous.  It  is  difficult  to 
conceive  how  uninspired  men  dare  so  pronounce 
condemnation  upon  their  fellow-men.  Rather  than 
be  obliged  to  recite  such  a  creed,  many  excellent 
Christian  men  would  become  open  infidels  ;  indeed, 
the  tendency  of  such  creeds  is  to  multiply  unbe 
lievers.  Although  received  in  the  Greek,  Roman, 
and  Anglican  Churches,  this  creed  is  omitted  from 
the  service  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in 
America.  Its  omission  led  to  very  sharp  discus- 
sion, but  its  opponents  prevailed.      How  can  men 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       129 


without  doing  violence  to  all  their  reasoning 
powers,  adopt  creeds  which  attribute  regenerating 
power  to  baptism,  infant  or  adult,  creeds  which 
affirm  the  existence  and  purifying  power  of  pur- 
gatory, and  which  teach  as  true  the  dogma  of 
transubstantiation,  or  even  consubstantiation  ?  The 
fact  is,  that  several  so-called  Christian  creeds  con- 
tain no  small  amount  of  heathen  superstition  rather 
than  the  principles  of  a  sound  Christianity;  and 
these  principles  are  taught  in  Protestant  as  well  as 
in  Roman  churches.  A  scriptural  Christianity  re- 
pudiates these  errors  in  toto.  Such  doctrines  are 
alike  unscriptural  and  unreasonable.  If  such  teach- 
ings were  true  Christianity,  many  true  men  would 
rather  be  intelligent  unbelievers  than  the  supersti- 
tious devotees  which  honest  faith  in  such  teachings 
necessitates.  It  is  known  that  ministers  of  some 
Anglican  churches  ask  their  assistants  to  recite  parts 
of  the  so-called  Athanasian  Creed.  Such  creeds 
are  a  temptation  to  intellectual  inanity  or  moral 
dishonesty.  Better  fully  believe  few  things  than 
half  believe  many  things. 

LATER  CREEDS. 

After  the  so-called  Athanasian  Creed  there  are 
no  general  symbols  of  faith  worthy  of  attention  until 
the  Reformation.  At  the  Council  of  Trent,  1545 
to  1 563,  the  Church  of  Rome  found  it  necessary  to 
give  a  more  detailed  statement  of  doctrine  than 
could  be  found  in  any  of  its  previous  creeds  ;  this 
became  a  necessity  because  of  the  aggressions  of 

I 


130    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Protestantism.  The  council  sat  at  intervals  for 
eighteen  years,  sometimes  at  Bologna,  but  chiefly 
at  Trent,  hence  the  name  of  the  council.  The  de- 
crees of  Trent  are  the  fixed  and  authoritative  sym- 
bols of  that  church.  Since  the  Reformation  the 
most  noted  Confessions  are  the  Lutheran,  the  Cal- 
vinistic,  or  Reformed,  the  Anglican,  or  Thirty-nine 
Articles  of  the  Church  of  England,  and  the  Puri- 
tan, or  Westminster  Confession. 

The  first  of  the  Lutheran  Confessions  is  the 
Confessio  Augiistana,  or  Confession  of  Augsburg. 
This  was  compiled  by  Melanchthon  and  presented 
to  the  Emperor  Charles  V.,  in  1530,  in  the  name 
of  the  Evangelical  States  of  Germany.  The  Thirty- 
nine  Articles  began  with  the  ten  of  1536,  then  at- 
tained the  number  of  forty-two  in  1552,  and  were 
finally  settled  as  thirty-nine,  1 562-1 571,  and  are 
supposed  to  have  been  chiefly  composed  by  Cran- 
mer.  In  1571  they  were  revised  by  convocation 
and  Parliament.  The  Calvinistic  or  Reformed 
churches  gave  us  numerous  Confessions.  The 
principal  are  :  (i)  the  Helvetic  Confession;  (2)  the 
Tetrapolitan  Confession,  1531  ;  (3)  the  Gallic  Con- 
fession, 1559;  (4)  the  Palatine,  or  Heidelberg  Con- 
fession, 1575  ;  and  (5)  the  Belgic  Confession,  1559. 

The  Westminster  Confession  was  the  result  of 
the  great  Puritan  excitements  of  the  seventeenth 
century.  The  Long  Parliament  in  1640  set  itself 
to  consider  the  question  of  the  reformation  of 
religion.  On  November  23,  1641,  "The  Famous 
Remonstrance,"  suggesting  the  calling  of  a  synod 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       I3I 

to  settle  the  peace  and  good  government  of  the 
church,  was  passed.  Out  of  this  proposal  came  the 
Westminster  Assembly.  The  ordinance  summoning 
it  was  issued  June  12,  1643.  Among  the  notable 
divines  participating  in  these  great  deliberations 
were  Rutherford,  Gillespie,  Henderson,  Lightfoot, 
Coleman,  and  Selden.  The  stamp  of  Calvinistic 
Presbyterianism  is  on  all  the  acts  of  the  assembly. 
The  sittings  began  in  1643,  and  continued  until 
February  22,  1649  J  ^'"^d  during  these  five  years 
and  a  half  there  were  one  thousand  one  hundred 
and  sixty-three  sessions.  As  this  is  the  latest  so  it 
is  the  most  elaborate  of  the  creeds.  The  Confession 
is  a  comprehensive  summary  of  theological  doc- 
trines ;  it  is  prepared  with  great  logical  skill  and 
rhetorical  beauty.  It  is  a  remarkable  monument 
of  learning  and  piety  ;  and  it  strongly  expresses 
the  dominant  thought  of  a  great  spiritual  movement 
which  has  colored  the  history  of  nations  and  the 
principles  and  practices  of  several  denominations. 
All  students  of  theology  and  of  national  reform 
ought  to  be  familiar  with  this  great  Confession.  In 
1643  the  assembly,  through  the  influence  of  Dr. 
Lightfoot,  voted  by  a  majority  of  one  against  giving 
the  choice  as  between  immersion  and  sprinkling  as 
baptism  ;  and  in  the  year  following  Parliament  sanc- 
tioned their  decision  and  decreed  that  sprinkling 
should  be  the  legal  mode  of  baptism.  It  is  inter- 
esting that  it  was  a  human  Parliament  and  not  the 
divine  word,  which  was  the  ultimate  authority  re- 
garding baptism. 


132    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  Westminster  Confession,  as  I  have  already 
remarked,  is  a  document  remarkable  for  its  rhetori- 
cal skill,  for  its  scholarly  breadth,  and  for  its  Christian 
devotion.  No  one  can  speak  lightly  of  so  historic, 
learned,  and  devout  a  Confession.  Were  your  speaker 
a  Presbyterian,  he  should  strongly  oppose  the  revi- 
sion of  this  historic  confession  ;  it  ought  rather  to  be 
left  intact  as  a  monument  to  the  wisdom  and  theo- 
logical learning  of  its  age.  If  the  Presbyterian 
Church  must  have  a  Confession,  let  a  new  one  be 
made  rather  than  attempt  to  cut,  trim,  and  remodel 
the  Westminster  Confession.  But  these  great  creeds 
do  not  conserve  doctrines.  The  Westminster  Con- 
fession does  not  secure  unity  now  in  the  Presbyterian 
Church.  Of  what  practical  gain  are  these  creeds 
to-day?  The  Baptist  denomination  has  no  creed, 
in  the  technical  sense  of  the  term ;  and  yet  with  its 
nearly  four  million  members  in  America  to-day,  it 
is  more  nearly  a  unit  in  faith  and  practice  than  are 
the  churches  with  their  "long  and  strong  creeds." 
This  is  a  fact  which  no  intelligent  student  of  current 
church  history  will  deny.  Better  far  it  is  to  go  at 
once  to  the  word  of  God  as  the  rule  of  faith  and 
practice  than  allow  the  creeds  of  very  fallible  men — 
creeds  which  were  the  result  often  of  unscriptural 
compromises — to  come  between  the  conscience  and 
its  God. 

"THE    HISTORIC    EPISCOPATE." 

The  Lambeth  Conference  made  much  use  of  the 
term  "Historic  Episcopate,"  in  discussing  the  ques- 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       1 33 

tion  of  church  unity.  It  was  proposed  that  the 
Historic  Episcopate  be  "locally  adapted  in  the 
methods  of  its  administration  to  the  varied  needs 
of  the  nations  and  peoples  called  of  God  into  the 
unity  of  his  church."  When  one  analyzes  the  re- 
marks made  regarding  the  Historic  Episcopate,  he 
inevitably  finds  an  implication  of  the  so-called 
apostolic  succession.  So  long  as  this  implication  is 
present,  a  great  majority  of  Christians  will  refuse  to 
endorse  the  Historic  Episcopate.  The  apostles  had 
no  successors,  and,  in  the  very  nature  of  the  case, 
could  not  have  successors.  The  Roman  Church 
puts  forward  the  claim  of  an  unbroken  succession 
in  the  most  dogmatic  terms.  This  church  excom- 
municates all  other  branches  of  the  church,  calling 
them  heretic  and  schismatic.  Many  in  Europe 
who  call  themselves  Protestants  of  various  names, 
ape  the  Roman  Church  in  this  regard.  The  Pro- 
testant Episcopal  Church  in  the  United  States,  and 
some  other  churches  of  various  names,  pride  them- 
selves on  their  apostolic  succession.  But  we  know 
that  it  was  necessary  that  an  apostle  should  have 
seen  the  Lord  ;  the  office,  therefore,  was  incapable 
of  succession  as  soon  as  the  original  eye-witnesses 
had  passed  away.  The  claim  of  an  uninterrupted 
clerical  succession  cannot  be  substantiated  by  satis- 
factory proof  All  churches  that  make  this  claim 
trace  their  line,  to  some  degree  at  least,  through 
the  channels  of  the  Roman  pontifs  ;  but  many  of  the 
records  of  these  early  popes  are  lost  and  can  never 
be  found.     We  do  not  know  that  the  Apostle  Peter 


134    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

ever  acted  as  bishop  in  Rome.  The  fact  is  that  this 
boasted  Hneage  is  a  worthless  myth.  The  claim 
made  by  some  churches  is  offensive  to  other  church- 
men ;  it  is  promotive  of  bigotry  and  destructive  of 
the  spirit  of  unity.  It  tends  constantly  toward  a 
dangerous  exclusiveness ;  it  is  also  as  unwise  in 
policy  as  it  is  uncharitable  in  principle. 

Dr.  G.  A.  Jacob,  late  head-master  of  Christ's 
Hospital,  and  the  author  of  the  "Ecclesiastical 
Polity  of  the  New  Testament,"  says:  "The  apos- 
tles had  no  successors  in  their  office ;  they  stand 
alone  as  the  divinely  inspired  teachers,  legislators, 
and  rulers  in  Christ's  church  and  kingdom."  With 
this  statement  unprejudiced  church  writers  will  gen- 
erally and  heartily  agree.  In  the  very  nature  of 
the  case  the  apostles  could  not  have  successors.  It 
is  not  possible  that  the  great  majority  of  believers 
can  accept  the  Historic  Episcopate,  as  the  term 
is  ordinarily  understood,  as  a  basis  of  unity  in  the 
church  of  Jesus  Christ. 

More  and  more  do  Baptists  see  the  wisdom  of 
making  the  word  of  God  the  only  rule  of  faith 
and  practice.  It  cannot  share  its  divine  author- 
ity with  creeds  made  by  men.  It  has  an  enlarg- 
ing, expanding,  and  self-adapting  meaning  which 
makes  it  the  book  of  all  centuries  and  countries. 
Human  creeds  are  stiff,  cold,  formal,  and  mechan- 
ical ;  but  the  word  of  God  is  living  and  life-giv- 
ing. Let  us  love  it,  obey  it,  and  rejoice  in  it. 
To  support  its  teachings  our  Baptist  fathers  lived 
and  died.      We   belong  to  a  noble  army  of  Bap- 


BAPTIST    POLITY    AND    HISTORIC    CREEDS       1 35 

tist  confessors  and  martyrs.  No  church  has  given 
nobler  testimony  to  the  teaching  of  the  Bible.  The 
Baptist  who  is  not  joyful  in  and  grateful  for  his 
ancient,  heroic,  and  sainted  ancestry  must  be  hope- 
lessly ignorant  of  a  brave  history,  or  hopelessly 
indifferent  to  the  chivalrous,  loyal,  and  divine  in 
human  character  and  in  Christian  fealty.  The 
Baptist  who  is  ashamed  of  his  principles  is  a  Bap- 
tist of  whom  his  principles  might  well  be  ashamed. 
Let  us  stand  loyally  and  lovingly  by  our  ancient 
faith,  our  historic  position,  and  our  Holy  Bible. 
While  it  stands  we  shall  stand,  and  "the  word  of 
our  God  shall  stand  forever. 


VI 

HISTORIC*  BAPTIST   PRINCIPLES^ 

THE  Baptist  denomination,  in  its  present  form, 
arose  about  three  hundred  years  ago — that 
is,  in  the  early  Stuart  period  in  England  and  in  the 
early  colonial  period  in  this  country.  This,  how- 
ever, is  by  no  means  the  date  of  its  origin ;  for  it 
stands  closely  related  to  preceding  bodies  of  sub- 
stantially the  same  character.  Its  principles  are 
those  of  Christ,  and  the  apostles  ;  and  these  princi- 
ples have  found  embodiment  in  many  ages  and 
countries,  by  those  who  were  often  hidden  from 
public  gaze,  often  cruelly  persecuted,  and  some  of 
whom  witnessed  for  their  faith  by  giving  their  lives. 
To  understand  the  historic  relations  of  the  Baptists 
to  other  Christians,  we' must  glance  backward  over 
the  earlier  centuries  of  the  church. 

The  fundamental  principle  of  the  Baptist  is  that 
salvation  comes  only  through  personal  faith  in  the 
Lord  Jesus  ;  that  baptism  and  other  ecclesiastical 
ceremonies  are  nothing  but  symbols  of  spiritual 
truths,  and  that  they  do  not  work  salvation,  nor  are 
essential  to  salvation.  This  doctrine,  now  held  by 
many   other  Christians,    was    in    earlier   centuries 

1  Written  for  and  printed  in  the  "  National  Tribune,"  Washing- 
ton, D.  C,  1891. 
136 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  1 3/ 

preached  by  the  Baptists  alone ;  and  it  is  the  con- 
troversy over  this  principle  which  gave  rise  in  many 
localities  to  Baptist  churches  as  witnesses  for  the 
truth. 

The  admonition  of  the  apostles  was,  "  Repent 
and  be  baptized."  This  was  addressed  to  Jews  who 
had  been  circumcised,  and  it  reveals  the  difference 
between  the  grounds  of  baptism  and  circumcision. 
The  Jew  was  circumcised  because  he  was  descended 
from  Abraham ;  but  he  could  be  baptized  only 
when  he  repented  of  his  sins  and  believed  in  Jesus 
Christ.  He  was  circumcised  on  Abraham's  faith ; 
but  he  could  be  baptized  only  on  his  own  personal 
faith.  Therefore,  while  circumcision  in  the  Jewish 
church  was  given  to  all,  baptism  in  the  apostolic 
church  was  given  only  to  believers,  only  to  those 
who  had  personally  accepted  Christ  as  their  Saviour, 
and  had  consecrated  themselves  to  his  service. 

Repentance  and  faith  had  to  precede  baptism. 
The  baptism  was  not  supposed  to  work  any  spiritual 
change  in  the  subject ;  it  was  given  him  only  as  a 
token  that  he  had  already  experienced  that  spiritual 
change.  As  the  uniform  is  put  on  a  man  not  to 
make  him  a  soldier,  but  because  he  has  already 
become  a  soldier,  so  baptism  was  given  not  to 
make  the  man  a  Christian,  but  because  it  was  be- 
lieved that  he  had  already  become  a  Christian. 

INFANT    BAPTISM. 

It  is  a  common  error,  however,  to  confound 
symbol  with  substance,  the  badge  of  a  character 


138    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

with  the  character  itself.  And  thus  in  time  men 
came  to  speak  of  baptism  as  being  itself  a  regen- 
eration, and  ere  long  the  idea  arose  that  baptism 
itself  would  make  a  man  a  Christian ;  and  further- 
more that  no  one  could  be  saved  without  baptism. 
This  led  to  the  custom  of  giving  baptism  to  infant 
children,  especially  to  those  who  were  sickly  and 
who  might  die  before  becoming  old  enough  to 
exercise  faith  for  themselves.  The  doctrine  of 
baptismal  regeneration,  the  idea  that  baptism  alone 
would  work  salvation  and  was  also  essential  to  sal- 
vation, it  was  this  error  and  this  alone  which  led  to 
the  practice  of  the  baptism  of  unconscious  infants. 

Finally,  it  was  not  merely  baptism  which  was 
given  to  children  too  young  to  believe,  for  as  early  as 
the  middle  of  the  third  century,  we  read  in  the 
works  of  Cyprian  of  the  bringing  of  little  babes 
to  the  Lord's  Supper  and  the  placing  of  the  sacra- 
mental bread  in  their  toothless  mouths.  This  is  still 
the  usage  of  the  Greek  Church,  and  for  centuries 
was  the  practice  of  the  Church  of  Rome.  It  is, 
moreover,  a  strictly  legal  usage ;  for  if  children 
may  be  given  baptism  without  intelligent  faith,  why 
may  they  not  be  brought  to  the  Lord's  Supper 
also?  Those  who  practise  infant  baptism  to-day 
can  give  no  logical  reason  for  conferring  it  upon 
unconscious  babes,  and  withholding  from  them  the 
ordinance  of  the  Lord's  Supper. 

But  it  required  some  centuries  for  the  usage  of 
infant  baptism  to  gain  full  currency.  In  the  biog- 
raphies of  many  of  the  great  leaders  of  the  early 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  1 39 

church  we  find  that,  though  their  parents  were 
Christians,  they  were  not  baptized  in  infancy. 
Among  these  are  Basil,  Chrysostom,  Gregory  Nazi- 
anzen,  Ambrose,  Augustine,  and  Ephrem  of  Edessa. 
As  Dean  Stanley  remarks,  in  the  early  ages  adult 
baptism  was  the  rule  and  infant  baptism  the  excep- 
tion. This  of  itself  would  show  that  infant  baptism 
was  not  of  apostolic  appointment,  but  of  later 
origin.  The  practice  gained,  however,  continually 
wider  acceptance  till  in  the  Middle  Ages,  together 
with  many  other  dangerous  errors,  it  had  become 
the  dominant  usage. 

But  the  doctrine  of  salvation  by  baptism,  and  the 
resultant  custom  of  the  baptism  of  infants,  were 
condemned  by  different  bodies  of  Christians  in 
various  ages  of  the  church.  Among  these  were 
the  Paulicians  of  Eastern  Europe,  with  the  Petro- 
brusians  and  Henricians  in  the  West.  A  long 
catalogue  could  be  given  of  bodies  of  Christians  of 
various  names,  who  in  different  parts  of  Europe 
and  in  different  centuries,  preached  the  Baptist 
doctrine  of  salvation  by  faith  alone.  Some  of  these 
are  said  to  have  held  certain  errors;  in  some  cases 
the  charge  may  be  true.  But  the  errorist  was  at 
least  an  independent  thinker,  and  the  daring  with 
which  he  dissented  from  some  widely  accepted  truths 
showed  itself  also  in  his  rejection  of  a  dominant 
superstition.  But  it  should  be  noted  that  we  know 
little  of  these  churches,  except  from  the  writings  of 
their  adversaries ;  and  it  is  well-nigh  certain  that 
many  of  the  charges  majle  against  them  had  no 


140    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

basis    except    in    the    blind    misrepresentations    of 
bigoted  opponents. 

If  the  records  of  church  history  were  complete, 
it  is  not  unlikely  that  it  would  appear  that  from  the 
days  of  the  apostles  to  the  present  time  there  has 
been  a  constant  succession  of  churches,  closely  akin 
to  the  Baptists  of  the  present  day,  congregations  of 
godly  men,  strictly  orthodox  in  belief,  protesting 
against  the  doctrine  of  baptismal  regeneration  with 
its  resultant  error,  the  baptism  of  infants.  New 
chapters  of  church  history  will  soon  be  written. 
New  fields,  for  the  most  part  untrodden  for  ages, 
will  soon  be  traversed.  Already  some  gleanings 
have  been  secured ;  and  soon  rich  harvests  will  be 
gathered.  Already  much  has  been  done  to  vindi- 
cate the  so-called  Anabaptists  from  one-sided  charges 
growing  out  of  ignorance  and  bigotry ;  already 
something  has  been  done  to  show  that  a  succession 
of  churches  akin  to  Baptists,  has  existed  since  the 
days  of  Christ  and  his  apostles.  We  do  not,  how- 
ever, rest  our  faith  on  any  unbroken  succession,  but 
on  the  clear  and  authoritative  commands  of  our 
Lord  and  his  apostles  in  the  New  Testament 

THE    REFORMATION    PROTEST. 

On  the  outbreak  of  the  Reformation,  this  Baptist 
protest  was  sounded  forth  throughout  the  length 
and  breadth  of  Europe.  When  Luther  and  others 
began  to  teach  that  men  were  justified  by  faith 
alone,  they  were  everywhere  confronted  by  the 
question.  Why,  then,   should  infants  be  baptized? 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I4I 

Congregations  of  the  opposers  of  infant  baptism 
arose  by  scores  and  by  hundreds.  Their  rapid 
multipHcation  has  seemed  to  many  historians  an 
evidence  that  they  were  not  entirely  a  new  growth, 
but  largely  a  part  of  an  earlier  ecclesiastical  move- 
ment, hitherto  concealed,  but  now  under  more 
favorable  circumstances  coming  to  the  light.  They 
were  especially  numerous  in  Switzerland,  Bavaria, 
the  Tyrol,  Moravia,  the  Rhine  country,  and  the 
Netherlands.  Among  their  leaders  were  men  not 
only  of  deep  piety  but  also  of  great  learning. 
They  were  nicknamed  Anabaptists,  or  Rebaptizers, 
because  they  baptized  on  profession  of  faith  those 
who  had  received  so-called  baptism  in  infancy.  But 
they  denied  the  charge  of  baptizing  again,  for  they 
declared  that  infant  baptism  was  no  baptism  at  all. 
And  the  charge  is  false  that  they  were  responsible 
for  the  Mijnster  insurrection  and  other  great  politi- 
cal disorders.  They  were  men  of  civil  virtue  as 
well  as  spiritual  purity.  By  scores  and  by  hun- 
dreds they  were  put  to  death  for  their  evangelical 
beliefs,  so  that  no  other  Christian  body  of  to-day 
has  given  so  many  martyrs  to  the  faith  of  a  pure 
gospel  as  did  they.  Their  congregations  are  still 
found  in  Holland  and  Germany,  where  from  Menno, 
one  of  their  early  leaders,  they  are  often  called 
Mennonites.  Some  of  their  congregations  are 
found  in  Pennsylvania  and  in  other  parts  of  this 
country.  They  differ  from  the  Baptists  in  cer- 
tain points,  but  historically  are  closely  related  to 
them. 


142    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 
RISE    OF  MODERN    BAPTISTS. 

We  now  come  to  the  rise  of  the  modern  Baptist 
denomination.  It  will  be  remembered  that  the 
Pilgrims  who  landed  at  Plymouth  went  first  from 
England  to  Holland.  While  there  they  came  in 
contact  with  the  Mennonites,  who  urged  that  as 
none  but  intelligent  believers  were  admitted  to  the 
Lord's  Supper,  so  none  but  intelligent  believers 
should  be  baptized.  Thomas  Helwys,  and  certain 
others  of  the  English  company,  felt  compelled  to 
adopt  this  view,  and  so  were  excluded  from  the 
ranks  of  their  brethren.  Helwys  and  his  associates 
returned  to  England  in  1611,  and  became  what  is 
generally  deemed  the  first  congregation  of  the 
modern  Baptist  denomination  in  Great  Britain. 
Though  Baptist  doctrines  were  preached  in  England 
in  earlier  times,  and  there  had  been  martyrs  for 
them,  it  is  not  certain  that  regular  congregations 
had  been  formed  and  maintained. 

A  quarter  of  a  century  after  Helwys'  return, 
John  Spilsbury  and  certain  others  of  an  Independent 
or  Congregational  church  in  London,  discarded 
infant  baptism,  and  they  also  formed  a  Baptist 
congregation.  From  these  two,  and  perhaps  other, 
sources,  Baptist  churches  were  formed  in  many 
parts  of  Great  Britain. 

Among  the  early  settlers  in  the  American  colo- 
nies were  Baptists  from  England  and  Wales.  All 
are  familiar  with  the  story  of  how  Roger  Williams, 
a  Congregational  minister  in  Salem,  Mass.,  adopted 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  1 43 

Baptist  doctrines,  was  banished  from  his  home,  and 
founded  a  colony  on  Baptist  principles.  The  First 
Baptist  Church  in  Providence  claims  to  have  been 
organized  in  1639,  but  some  think  that  the  First 
Baptist  Church  at  Newport  was  formed  a  year 
earlier.  The  dates  of  these  beginnings  are  uncer- 
tain. It  is  sufficient,  however,  to  say  that  Baptist 
churches  were  planted  here  in  the  early  colonial 
days,  and  now  are  found  throughout  the  whole  land, 
and  increasing  at  the  rate  of  nearly  three  each  day 
in  the  year. 

The  principles  of  the  Baptists  have  been  widely 
adopted  outside  of  their  own  ranks.  The  giving 
of  baptism  to  believers  only  involves  a  "converted 
church-membership,"  but  infant  baptism  brings  into 
the  church  those  who  are  still  unconverted,  unless 
a  spiritual  change  is  always  wrought  in  baptism. 
In  the  Roman  Catholic,  Lutheran,  and  Episco- 
palian churches  it  is  not  necessary  to  give  evi- 
dence of  conversion  in  order  to  admission  to  the 
Lord's  Supper  and  full  church-membership ;  a  cer- 
tificate of  baptism  is  all  that  is  essential.  Less 
than  a  century  ago  persons  baptized  in  infancy 
became  full  members  in  Presbyterian,  Reformed, 
and  Congregational  churches  also  without  any  de- 
mand for  evidence  of  a  change  of  heart,  and  in 
Hodge's  Theology,  the  great  Princeton  text-book, 
this  is  laid  down  as  the  correct  procedure.  But  this 
left  no  difference  between  the  church-member  and 
the  respectable  outsider,  except  that  the  former  had 
gone  through  the  ceremony  of  baptism.     All  essen- 


144    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tial  difference  between  the  church  and  the  world 
was  obscured,  and  was  even  blotted  out.  A  gentle- 
man brought  up  in  one  of  the  State  Churches  of 
Europe,  on  being  asked  whether  he  was  a  Christian, 
responded  indignantly,  "Do  I  look  like  a  Jew  or  a 
Turk?"  He  had  been  baptized  and  confirmed, 
and  this  completed  his  idea  of  being  a  Christian. 

But  in  the  "great  awakening,"  under  the  preach- 
ing of  Edwards  and  Whitefield,  a  hundred  and  fifty 
years  ago,  when  it  was  proclaimed  that  a  man, 
even  though  a  baptized  church-member,  must  be 
converted,  immediately  the  question  arose  why 
persons  should  be  baptized  and  brought  into  the 
church  before  they  w^ere  converted.  The  more 
earnest  Christians,  by  thousands  and  thousands, 
adopted  the  Baptist  idea  of  a  converted  church- 
membership,  rejecting  the  baptism  of  infants ;  and 
whole  congregations,  with  their  ministers,  became 
Baptists.  There  was  thus  a  marvelous  increase  in 
Baptist  ranks  as  a  result  of  this  great  movement, 
and  preachers  of  to-day,  like  Mr.  Moody,  who 
strongly  set  forth  the  doctrine  that  salvation  comes 
not  through  baptism  and  church-membership,  but 
only  through  personal  repentance  and  faith,  are 
doing  a  vast  deal  to  diffuse  Baptist  principles. 
Their  converts  practically  become  Baptists,  even 
though  they  join  other  than  Baptist  churches.  The 
idea  that  only  converted  persons  should  belong  to 
the  church  was  originally  a  distinctively  Baptist 
tenet ;  but  now  it  has  been  adopted  by  nearly  all 
evangelical  Christians.      Five  Presbyterians  out  of 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I45 

six,  if  asked  regarding  one  who  had  been  sprinkled 
in  infancy  but  had  not  yet  made  a  profession  of 
faith,  whether  he  belonged  to  the  church,  would 
answer  No !  Although  still,  as  we  have  already 
seen,  some  Presbyterians  insist  that  all  who  have 
received  infant  baptism  in  their  ranks  are  members 
of  their  churches. 

THE  SALVATION  OF  INFANTS. 

There  is  another  doctrine  which,  though  set  forth 
at  first  by  Baptists  alone,  is  now  held  by  nearly  or 
quite  all  evangelical  Christians — the  doctrine  that 
all  who  die  in  infancy  are  saved.  The  baptism  of 
infants  was  an  outgrowth  of  .the  doctrine  of  bap- 
tismal regeneration,  the  idea  that  in  baptism  one  is 
made  a  child  of  God,  and  that  one  cannot  be  saved 
without  baptism.  Infant  baptism  was  based  on  the 
idea  that  all  infants  dying  unbaptized  would  be  lost. 
This  dark  and  dreary  superstition  cast  a  gloom  over 
the  history  of  the  church  for  centuries.  There  was 
mortal  terror  at  the  thought  that  an  infant  should 
die  unbaptized.  Sometimes  in  difficulty  of  birth 
the  infant  was  sprinkled  before  birth,  and  sometimes, 
it  will  not  be  denied,  the  Caesarean  operation  was 
performed,  that  the  babe  might  not  die  unbaptized. 
One  dislikes  to  refer  to  matters  of  this  sort,  but 
history  must  be  truthfully  told.  The  fact  is  that 
the  history  of  infant  baptism  is  one  of  the  most 
horrible  chapters  in  the  annals  of  the  church. 
Abundant  proofs  could  be  given  to  justify  that 
strong  statement.      Nor  is  this  superstition  wholly 


146    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

extinct.  The  Lutherans,  in  their  Augsburg  Con- 
fession, "condemn  the  Anabaptists,  who  teach  that 
infants  may  be  saved  without  baptism."  Not  only- 
Roman  CathoHc,  but  also  Episcopalian  parents,  will 
feel  uneasy  till  their  babe  has  been  "christened" — 
that  is,  made  a  Christian  (in  their  belief) ;  and  often 
a  Presbyterian,  when  his  child  has  died,  will  comfort 
himself  greatly  with  the  thought  that  it  had  been 
sprinkled,  as  if  the  dear  little  one's  salvation  had 
been  made  any  more  certain  by  the  application  of 
a  few  drops  or  an  ocean  of  water.  Many  are  the 
cases  in  which  the  Presbyterian  or  Methodist  min- 
ister, and  occasionally  a  Baptist  minister,  is  asked 
to  perform  this  service,  and  has  been  summoned 
at  midnight  by  agonized  parents  to  hasten  to  bap- 
tize their  dying  child. 

Infant  baptism  is  not  a  beautiful  ceremony ;  it  is 
rather  the  historical  embodiment  of  a  gross  and 
revolting  superstition.  As  the  little  babe  is  borne 
down  the  aisle  in  its  holiday  garb,  the  whole  mean- 
ing of  the  ceremony  is  that  unless  certain  drops  of 
water  were  sprinkled  on  its  brow  that  beautiful 
little  creature  would  go  down  to  the  darkness  of 
eternal  despair.  This  is  a  superstition  akin  to  that 
of  "extreme  unction" — the  one  the  rite  of  baptism 
to  unconscious  babes,  the  other  that  of  extreme  unc- 
tion to  unconscious  men  and  women.  Such  supersti- 
tions naturally  drive  thoughtful  men  into  infidelity, 

But  in  Baptist  circles  it  was  taught  not  only  that 
baptism  was  not  necessary  to  salvation,  but  that  all 
who  died  in  infancy  are  saved  through  the  blood  of 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I47 

Christ.  This  doctrine  was  held  long  by  Baptists 
only.  Down  to  quite  recent  times,  if  a  man  said 
that  the  dying  babe  of  a  Jew  or  a  Turk  or  a  heathen 
was  saved,  it  was  known  at  once  that  he  was  a  Bap- 
tist. But  this,  which  was  originally  a  distinctively 
Baptist  tenet,  now  prevails  to  a  greater  or  less  de- 
gree in  all  evangelical  circles.  And  corresponding 
to  this  difference  of  Baptist  doctrine  there  has  been 
an  advance  toward  the  Baptist  usage  of  the  bap- 
tism of  believers  only.  If  salvation  is  wrought  in 
baptism,  and  without  baptism  there  is  no  salvation, 
then  it  is  reasonable  that  infants  should  be  baptized, 
and  without  any  outward  evidence  of  conversion  be 
admitted  to  full  membership  in  the  church.  But 
renounce  the  doctrine  of  baptismal  regeneration, 
and  no  ground  is  left  for  the  baptism  of  infants. 
Should  infants  be  baptized  because  they  are  natur- 
ally innocent?  Then  the  missionary  should  bap- 
tize all  the  babes  in  a  heathen  tribe,  for  of  such 
also  is  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  they  being  as  inno- 
cent naturally  as  the  offspring  of  Christians.  Is 
infant  baptism  proper  as  a  dedication  of  children 
to  God  ?  But  what  is  this  dedication  ?  It  is  simply 
a  vow  on  the  part  of  the  parents  that  they  will 
strive  to  lead  the  child  to  dedicate  himself  to  God. 
Now,  when  a  missionary  goes  to  a  heathen  tribe, 
he  in  this  sense  dedicates  that  tribe  to  God.  He 
promises  to  do  in  the  case  of  the  tribe  what  the 
parents  promise  to  do  in  the  case  of  the  child  ;  but 
shall  he  therefore  baptize  the  whole  tribe  at  the 
outset  ? 


148    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  fact  is  that  infant  baptism,  which  had  its 
historical  origin  in  the  doctrine  of  baptismal  regen- 
eration, has  no  logical  foundation  but  in  that  doc- 
trine. This  is  becoming  more  and  more  plain  to 
all  evangelical  Christians,  and  the  result  is  a  grow- 
ing abandonment  of  the  practice.  Among  the 
Roman  Catholics,  Lutherans,  and  Episcopalians 
who  still  believe  in  baptismal  regeneration,  the  bap- 
tism of  infants  is  still  observed  with  substantial  uni- 
formity. But  Presbyterians,  Congregationalists,  and 
Methodists,  who  have  abandoned  this  doctrine,  show 
a  progressive  abandonment  of  the  usage. 

In  a  recent  discourse.  Rev.  O.  C.  Sargent,  of 
New  Hampshire,  put  it  very  concisely,  as  follows  : 

"  Look  at  the  signs  of  the  times.  Forty  years 
ago  few  of  the  churches  would  immerse.  To-day 
we  do  not  know  of  any  save  the  Roman,  which  is 
not  willing  in  special  cases.  Infant  baptism  is  fast 
dying  out.  The  recent  agitations  and  the  frequent 
vain  appeals  of  some  of  the  old  fathers  for  this 
practice  show  how  slowly,  yet  how  surely,  it  is  pass- 
ing away.  In  i860  two  thousand  more  infants 
were  sprinkled  than  adults  in  the  M,  E.  Church, 
while  in  1870  thirteen  thousand  six  hundred  more 
adults  than  infants  received  the  rite."  Those  who 
desire  fuller  figures  should  read  the  pamphlet  on 
this  subject  by  Prof  H.  C.  Vedder.  Its  statistics 
show  that  evangelical  Christians  incline  more  and 
more  to  give  baptism  only  to  believers,  and  that 
they  are  becoming  Baptists  in  fact  though  not  in 
name. 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  1 49 

DOCTRINE    OF    RELIGIOUS    LIBERTY. 

There  is  another  doctrine  which,  though  origi- 
nally a  Baptist  tenet,  is  now  held  outside  Baptist 
circles,  namely,  the  doctrine  of  religious  freedom — 
the  doctrine  that  the  civil  magistrate  has  no  right- 
ful authority  in  purely  religious  matters.  In  the 
Hebrew  nation,  and  in  ancient  Gentile  govern- 
ments also,  the  Church  and  the  State  were  one. 
The  Jewish  high  priest  was  a  civil  functionary 
and  the  Roman  emperor  was  pontifex  maximus. 
The  civil  and  ecclesiastical  governments  were  iden- 
tical, or  at  least  affiliated,  and  the  civil  magis- 
trate concerned  himself  about  religious  matters. 
In  the  Middle  Ages  the  prevalence  of  the  doctrine 
of  baptismal  regeneration,  and  the  consequent  prac- 
tically universal  baptism  of  infants,  made  every  per- 
son a  church-member  as  well  as  a  citizen.  Thus 
Church  and  State  again  became  identical,  or  at 
least  conterminous,  and  the  civil  magistrate  con- 
cerned himself  with  religious  as  well  as  secular 
interests.  But  the  Baptist  doctrine  that  one  be- 
came a  true  Christian  and  a  rightful  member  of 
the  church  only  when  he  personally  made  a  profes- 
sion of  faith,  left  a  vast  number,  indeed  a  great 
majority,  of  citizens  outside  the  church,  and  there 
was  a  division  between  the  ecclesiastical  body  and 
the  civil  community.  The  church  became  what  it 
was  in  the  apostles'  day,  a  private  society,  a  group 
of  persons  apart  from  the  main  body  of  citizens,  a 
body  called  out  from  others,  professing  certain  ex- 


150    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

perimental  truths,  and  devoted  to  their  mainte- 
nance and  propagation,  and  thus  Church  and  State 
were  divorced  and  each  was  remanded  to  its  own 
sphere. 

Again,  in  the  days  when  there  was  a  full  ad- 
herence to  the  doctrine  of  baptismal  regenera- 
tion and  of  direct  spiritual  efficacy  of  ecclesiastical 
ceremonies,  it  was  logical  for  the  civil  power  to  at- 
tempt by  physical  force  to  make  men  Christians. 
If  baptizing  a  person  would  change  his  spiritual 
nature  and  his  relations  to  God,  all  that  was  neces- 
sary to  make  a  nation  a  Christian  nation  was  to 
compel  its  members  to  be  baptized  and  to  observe 
the  other  ecclesiastical  rites.  If  salvation  came 
through  outward  ceremonies,  the  observance  of 
which  could  be  compelled  by  force,  it  was  possible 
for  the  civil  power  to  compel  men  to  become  Chris- 
tians. It  could  not  only  lead  them  to  the  water  of 
life,  but  by  thumbscrew  and  fagot  could  make  them 
drink. 

Thus  Charlemagne  and  other  Christian  conquer- 
ors compelled  vanquished  barbarians  to  go  down 
into  the  water  by  tens  of  thousands  to  be  baptized. 
And  such  compulsion  seemed  a  solemn  duty  to 
those  who  believe  that  the  failure  to  be  baptized 
left  the  soul  to  be  lost.  If  baptism  could  make 
one  a  Christian,  the  colonel  in  our  late  war  was 
right  who  gave  orders  for  a  detail  of  men  to  be 
baptized.  But  the  Baptist  doctrine,  that  a  man 
could  become  a  Christian  only  by  the  voluntary 
and  free  action  of  his  own  spiritual  nature,  made 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I5I 

religion  a  matter  which  could  be  settled  only  be- 
tween the  man  and  his  God,  thus  leaving  nothing 
to  be  done  by  the  civil  magistrate,  who  could  con- 
trol only  the  man's  outward  actions  but  could  not 
reach  his  heart.  A  moment's  thought  will  show 
that  there  is  no  ground  whatever  for  saying  that 
the  only  reason  why  the  Baptists  did  not  strive  to 
extend  their  doctrines  by  force,  as  did  others,  was 
that  they  had  no  power  so  to  do.  It  was  a  part  of 
their  fundamental  belief  that  external  force  was 
utterly  ineffectual  to  make  men  Christians.  Others 
might  abstain  from  persecution  because  their  pity 
was  stronger  than  their  religious  zeal ;  but  Bap- 
tists were  restrained  from  it  by  logical  deductions, 
namely,  because  they  held  that  becoming  a  Chris- 
tian was  an  act  of  the  Spirit  which  outward  force 
could  not  compel.  So  they  always  taught  that  the 
civil  power  should  take  no  cognizance  of  religious 
beliefs  or  purely  religious  practices  of  men,  whether 
orthodox  or  heretic,  Turk  or  heathen,  but  that  these 
should  be  left  solely  to  the  judgment  of  God. 

Some  other  Christians  have  been  very  candid  in 
recognizing  that  it  was  the  Baptists  who  first  preached 
the  great  doctrine  of  religious  freedom.  But  it  has 
not  always  been  perceived  that  this  doctrine  was  a 
logical  outgrowth  of  the  fundamental  Baptist  prin- 
ciple of  a  converted  church-membership,  and  that 
church  ceremonies  are  to  be  used  only  when  men 
have  already  become  Christians.  The  divorce  be- 
tween Church  and  State  was  not  merely  a  lucky 
thought  of  astute  Baptist  philosophers  ;  nor  was  it 


152    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

because  they  were  in  themselves  better,  kinder, 
and  wiser  than  others  ;  but  it  was  the  logical  out- 
come of  distinctive  Baptist  principles.  The  Baptists 
preceded  others  in  declaring  the  true  relations  of 
the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  bodies,  not  because  they 
were  superior  to  other  Christians  in  their  under- 
standing of  civil  principles,  but  because  they  held 
an  ecclesiastical  tenet  which  was  correct  where  others 
were  in  error.  The  condemnation  of  the  use  of 
force  in  religion  was  originally  a  Baptist  peculiar- 
ity. Down  to  a  comparatively  late  date,  if  a  man 
said  that  the  civil  magistrate  should  not  interfere 
in  strictly  religious  matters  it  was  known  thereby 
that  he  was  a  Baptist.  But  this  doctrine  has  now 
extended  to  all  churches  in  our  own  land,  and  it 
is  rapidly  becoming  the  doctrine  of  all  Christian 
countries.  Baptists  have  had  in  this  respect  a  noble 
mission,  and  right  nobly  have  they  borne  its  bur- 
dens and  discharged  its  obligations. 

THE    DOCTRINE    OF    IMMERSION. 

Thus  far  nothing  has  been  said  of  baptism  or  im- 
mersion. In  a  given  society  the  question,  What 
shall  be  the  initiation  ceremony  ?  is  not  so  impor- 
tant as  the  question.  Who  shall  be  initiated  ?  And 
so  the  point  insisted  on  by  Baptists  is  not  so  much 
that  immersion  is  the  only  baptism,  as  that  only 
believers  should  be  baptized.  But  the  erroneous 
doctrine  of  baptismal  regeneration  which  led  to 
the  baptism  of  infants  gave  rise  to  another  super- 
stitious practice,  namely,  the  substitution  of  pour- 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I  53 

ing  and  sprinkling  for  baptism.  The  controversy 
on  this  subject  first  appears  in  the  letter  of  Cyprian 
to  Magnus,  about  the  year  250.  There  were  cer- 
tain persons  who  had  been  converted  in  sickness 
when  they  could  not  be  immersed,  so  water  was 
poured  upon  them  as  they  lay  upon  their  beds. 
But  there  was  a  refusal  to  recognize  this  as  valid 
baptism,  and  the  question  was  referred  to  Cyprian, 
who  was  one  of  the  leaders  in  the  church.  After 
discussing  the  matter,  he  gives  it  as  his  view  that 
in  a  case  of  strict  necessity  pouring  or  sprinkling  is 
sufficient ;  but  he  freely  admits  that  his  mind  is  not 
clear  on  the  subject.  His  words  are  :  "  So  far  as 
my  poor  ability  comprehendeth  the  matter,"  and 
"So  far  as  in  me  lies,  I  have  shown  what  I  think." 
That  these  expressions  are  not  used  in  mock  mod- 
esty is  shown  in  the  fact  that  he  declares  that  he 
does  not  wish  to  influence  the  action  of  others  in 
such  cases,  and  he  also  suggests  that  should  these 
converts  recover  they  may  be  immersed,  that  is, 
baptized. 

Now  this  letter  shows  beyond  dispute  that  the 
ordinary  act  of  baptism  in  that  early  day  was  im- 
mersion. The  question  whether  immersion  could 
be  dispensed  with  in  extraordinary  cases  shows  that 
in  ordinary  cases  it  was  always  used.  In  the  whole 
discussion  it  is  assumed  that  when  a  convert  can  be 
baptized,  baptism  is  of  course  to  be  administered. 
No  one  in  that  day  proposed  to  employ  pouring  or 
sprinkling  except  when  baptism  or  immersion  was 
impossible.      And    this  letter   proves,    with    equal 


154    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

clearness,  that  immersion  was  the  only  act  of  bap- 
tism practised  by  the  apostles.  Had  they  ever  used 
pouring  or  sprinkling,  even  in  a  single  case,  Cyprian, 
who  lived  so  soon  after  them,  would  of  course  have 
known  it,  and  of  course  would  never  have  admitted 
that  there  was  the  least  question  as  to  the  propriety 
of  such  a  use.  That  he  never  cites  the  apostles  in 
support  of  his  position,  that  he  gives  it  merely  as 
his  opinion  that  pouring  or  sprinkling  may  be  used 
in  extraordinary  cases,  shows  not  only  that  in  his 
time  neither  was  used  in  ordinary  cases,  but  also 
that  the  apostles  had  never  used  them  in  any  case. 
That  the  baptism  of  the  apostolic  church  was 
immersion  is  the  testimony  of  scholars  of  all  de- 
nominations. Martin  Luther  declares  immersion 
to  have  been  the  primitive  act  of  baptism.  John 
Calvin  says:  "It  is  certain  that  immersion  was 
observed  by  the  ancient  church."  John  Wesley 
says  that  it  was  "the  custom  of  the  first  church." 
To  the  same  effect  are  the  utterances  of  later 
scholars  of  all  Christian  bodies,  Roman  Catholic, 
Lutheran,  Episcopalian,  and  Presbyterian.  Says 
the  late  Dean  Stanley:  "There  can  be  no  question 
that  the  original  form  of  baptism  was  complete 
immersion."  Says  the  well-known  historian,  Dr. 
Philip  Schaff :  "  Immersion  and  not  sprinkling  was 
unquestionably  the  original,  normal  form."  Whole 
columns  could  be  filled  with  similar  quotations 
from  the  ablest  scholars  ;  and  be  it  noted  that  not 
a  single  writer  of  the  rank  of  these  named  rejects 
these  statements.     To  deny  that  immersion  was  the 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I  55 

primitive  act  of  baptism  is  really  the  wildest  ab- 
surdity. If  scholarship  can  prove  anything,  it 
proves  all  that  Baptists  claim ;  on  no  other  point  of 
church  history  or  Scripture  exegesis  is  the  scholar- 
ship of  the  world  so  nearly  united. 

But  how  then  came  pouring  and  sprinkling  to 
be  used?  It  is  not  difficult  to  answer  this  question. 
It  was  because  there  had  arisen  in  the  church  this 
superstitious  idea  that  water  baptism  was  necessary 
to  salvation.  When,  therefore,  a  man  was  con- 
verted on  a  dying  bed  or  in  prison,  when  baptism 
was  out  of  the  question,  pouring  or  sprinkling  was 
resorted  to  as  the  nearest  possible  approach  to  the 
normal  act  of  baptism.  These  were  not  considered 
regular  baptisms,  but  were  by  some  considered 
allowable  substitutes  when  the  prescribed  act  was 
out  of  the  question.  Pouring  and  sprinkling  were 
at  first  used  only  in  cases  of  necessity.  But  their 
superior  convenience  led  to  their  being  employed 
more  and  more,  till  in  the  course  of  ages  they  in 
Western  Europe  supplanted  baptism  almost  entirely. 
In  the  Greek  Church,  however,  immersion  is  still 
the  act  of  baptism.  It  continued  the  ordinary  bap- 
tism of  the  Church  of  Rome  for  thirteen  hundred 
years.  It  was  the  practice  in  England  down  to  the 
reign  of  Elizabeth.  The  Anglican  prayer-book  still 
directs  that  the  priest,  naming  the  child,  "shall  dip 
it  in  the  water  discreetly  and  warily"  ;  adding,  how- 
ever, that  if  the  parents  "shall  certify  that  the  child 
is  weak,  it  shall  suffice  to  pour  water  upon  it."  No 
"priest"  of  the  Church  of  England  has  any  right  to 


156    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

this  day  to  sprinkle  or  pour  water  upon  a  babe,  ex- 
cept the  parents  certify  to  its  delicate  health ;  it  would 
seem  as  if  the  great  majority  of  children  in  that  church 
are  in  very  feeble  physical  condition.  The  rubric 
of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  the  United 
States  of  America  directs  that  the  minister  "shall 
dip  it  in  the  water  discreetly,  or  shall  pour  water 
upon  it,"  not  positively  prescribing  immersion,  but 
giving  it  the  preference  of  a  prior  mention.  The 
late  Dr.  Ewer,  of  New  York,  always  baptized 
the  babes ;  he  would  not  practise  pouring  or 
sprinkling.  The  same  is  true  of  other  clergymen 
of  the  Episcopal  Church  who  are  advocating  a  re- 
turn at  least  to  the  proper  act  of  baptism.  It  is 
not  too  much  to  say  that  in  a  quarter  of  a  century 
baptisteries  in  all  Protestant  churches  will  be  by  no 
means  uncommon.  These  rules  or  permissions  in 
churches  which  have  abandoned  the  use  of  immer- 
sion, are  historical  reminiscences  of  the  primitive 
practices. 

Those  churches  in  Switzerland,  Germany,  and 
Holland  which  have  been  mentioned  as  coming  out 
in  condemnation  of  the  baptism  of  infants  generally 
continued  the  usage  of  pouring  and  sprinkling. 
But  when  Baptist  churches  were  organized  in  Eng- 
land and  America,  they  took  the  position  that  not 
only  were  believers  the  only  proper  subjects  of 
baptism,  but  that  a  burial  in  water  was  its  only  true 
act.  Therefore,  the  reason  why  Baptists  practise 
nothing  but  immersion  is  this :  they  do  not  believe 
that  water  baptism  is  essential  to  salvation.     Ac- 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I  57 

cepting  the  testimony  of  all  scholarship  that  immer- 
sion was  the  baptism  of  the  apostolic  church,  and 
prescribed  by  Christ,  they  administer  this  when  it 
is  possible ;  but  when,  as  in  case  of  sickness,  this 
is  out  of  the  question,  they  let  the  convert  die 
without  water  baptism.  So  far  from  "making  too 
much  of  baptism,"  as  is  often  charged  upon  them, 
no  Christians,  except  the  Quakers,  who  reject  all 
water  baptism,  make  so  little  of  it  as  they.  So  far 
from  making  baptism  necessary  to  salvation,  they 
make  salvation  necessary  to  baptism.  The  as- 
sertion that  Baptists  believe  that  baptism  is  nec- 
essary to  salvation  is  a  declaration  as  far  as 
possible  from  the  truth.  It  is  a  statement  born 
either  of  unpardonable  ignorance,  or  unchristian 
malice.  It  ought  to  be  known  that  Baptists  hold 
that  if  the  providence  of  God  makes  it  impossible, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  thief  on  the  cross,  or  of  many 
on  sick-beds,  to  render  obedience,  the  command  is 
not  binding  in  such  a  case.  The  case  is  just  the 
opposite.  The  very  reason  why  they  never  resort 
to  sprinkling,  which  can  always  be  administered, 
but  practise  only  baptism,  which  is  occasionally  out 
of  the  question,  is  that  they  hold  that  baptism  is 
not  essential  to  salvation,  and  that  a  true  convert's 
soul  will  not  be  imperiled  if  he  is  allowed  to  die 
without  having  received  water  baptism. 

Pouring  and  sprinkling  would  never  have  been 
thought  of  but  for  the  idea  that  a  man's  soul  was 
imperiled  if  he  were  suffered  to  die  without  some- 
thing in  the  shape  of  baptism.      Baptists  condemn 


158    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

the  use  of  pouring  and  sprinkling  as  having  been 
based  on  the  superstitious  idea  that  something 
which  at  least  somewhat  resembled  baptism  was 
necessary  to  salvation.  If  they  believed  that  water 
baptism  would  make  one  a  Christian,  they  would 
baptize  infants  as  well  as  believers.  If  they  be- 
lieved that  a  dying  man's  soul  would  be  lost  unless 
he  received  something  in  the  nature  of  baptism, 
they  could  use  pouring  and  sprinkling  as  well  as 
immersion.  But,  holding  clearly  and  firmly  that 
salvation  depends  only  on  intelligent  faith  and  not 
on  some  baptismal  ceremony,  they  claim  that  intel- 
ligent believers  are  the  only  proper  subjects  of 
baptism,  and  that  the  burial  in  water,  the  original 
ceremony,  is  its  only  proper  act.  And  Baptists 
refuse  to  practise  pouring  and  sprinkling  for  bap- 
tism, because  they  also  hold  that  these  are  not  a 
fulfillment  of  Christ's  command.  John  Calvin  says 
that  "the  very  word  baptize  signifies  to  immerse." 
Martin  Luther  declares  the  same.  The  latest  stand- 
ard Greek  lexicons,  those  of  Sophocles,  Wilke,  Cre- 
mer,  and  Liddell  and  Scott  (later  editions),  define 
baptism  as  meaning  immersion,  and  they  recognize 
no  other  meaning.  He  who  would  go  back  of  the 
lexicons  and  judge  for  himself,  will  find  in  Conant's 
"  Meaning  and  Use  of  Baptism  "  a  citation  of  every 
case  in  which  the  word  is  used  by  ancient  writers, 
and  he  will  see  that  in  each  case  the  idea  of  sub- 
mersion is  involved.  The  Septuagint,  the  Greek 
version  of  the  Old  Testament  current  in  Jesus' 
day,  says  that  Naaman,  the  Syrian,  went  down  into 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  I  59 

the  Jordan  and  dipped,  baptized  (Gr.  cbaptisatd) 
himself  seven  times.  This  means  that  he  dipped 
or  immersed  himself;  and  when  the  New  Testa- 
ment says  that  John  was  baptizing  it  means  that  he 
was  immersing. 

TESTIMONY    REGARDING    BOTH    ORDINANCES. 

The  doctrine  and  practice  of  the  Baptists  with 
reference  to  the  two  Christian  ordinances  have  been 
abundantly  justified  and  upheld  by  the  candid 
testimony  of  scholarly  theologians  of  other  de- 
nominations. From  the  great  mass  of  these  weighty 
admissions  and  endorsements  the  following  are  a  few 
specimens,  those  relating  to  baptism  coming  first : 

To  baptize  signifies  to  plunge,  as  is  granted  by  all  the 
world. — Bossuet,  Roman  Catholic. 

It  does  not  appear  from  Scripture  that  even  one  infant 
'was  ever  baptized. — Keenan,  "  Docirmal  Catechisfii,"  Ro- 
man Catholic. 

In  the  primitive  church,  baptism  was  a  total  immersion 
or  burial  as  it  were. — Bcchman,  Lutheran. 

The  Baptist  position  is  incontrovertible  from  the  Protes- 
tant standpoint,  since  they  have  the  clear  Bible  text  for 
baptism,  and  church  tradition  decides  neither  for  nor 
against. — Dr.  Ddllingcr,   Old  Catholic. 

Baptize  undoubtedly  signifies  immersion.  No  proof  can 
be  found  that  it  signifies  anything  else  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, and  in  the  most  ancient  Christian  literature. — Prof. 
Harnack,  Lutheran. 

All  attempts  to  make  out  infant  baptism  from  the  Old 
Testament  fail.  It  is  totally  opposed  to  the  spirit  of  the 
apostolic  age,  and  to  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  New 
Testament. — Prof.  Lange,  Ltitheran. 


l60    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  change  from  immersion  to  sprinkling  has  set  aside 
the  larger  part  of  the  apostolic  language  regarding  baptism, 
and  has  altered  the  very  meaning  of  the  word. — Dean 
Stanley,  Episcopalian. 

This  passage  (Rom.  6  :  3,  4)  cannot  be  understood  un- 
less it  is  borne  in  mind  that  the  primitive  baptism  was  by 
immersion.  —  Conybeare  and  Howson,  Episcopalians. 

Among  all  the  persons  that  are  recorded  as  baptized  by 
the  apostles,  there  is  no  express  mention  of  any  infants. — 
Dr.    Wall,  Episcopalian. 

"Buried  with  him,"  alluding  to  the  ancient  manner  of 
baptizing  by  immersion. — John  Wesley,  Methodist. 

To  be  baptized  into  Christ  is  to  receive  the  doctrine  of 
Christ  crucified,  and  to  receive  baptism  as  proof  of  the 
genuineness  of  that  faith. — Adam  Clarke,  Methodist. 

The  very  word  baptize,  however,  signifies  to  immerse, 
and  it  is  certain  that  immersion  was  the  practice  of  the  an- 
cient church.  —  Calvin,  Presbyterian. 

Respecting  the  form  of  baptism,  therefore,  .  .  .  the  im- 
partial historian  is  compelled  by  exegesis  and  history  sub- 
stantially to  yield  the  point  to  the  Baptists,  as  is  done,  in 
fact,  ...  by  most  German  scholars. — Philip  Schaff,  Pres- 
byterian. 

Scripture  knows  nothing  of  the  baptism  of  infants. — Dr. 
Hanna,  Presbyterian. 

Here  follow  a  few  out  of  many  available  strong 
Pedobaptist  endorsements  of  the  Baptist  principle 
and  practice  of  restricting  the  Lord's  Supper  to  the 
actually  baptized  : 

Among  all  the  absurdities  that  ever  were  held,  none  ever 
maintained  that  any  person  should  partake  of  the  commun- 
ion before  he  was  baptized. — Dr.    Wall,  Episcopalian. 

If  I  believed  with  the  Baptists  that  none  are  baptized 
but  those  who  are  immersed  on  profession  of  faith,  then  I 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  l6l 

should  with  them  refuse  to  commune  with  any  others.  — Dr. 
John  Hall,  Presbyterian. 

It  is  evident  that,  according  to  our  views  of  baptism,  we 
can  admit  them  to  our  communion  ;  but  with  their  views 
of  baptism,  it  is  equally  evident  they  can  never  reciprocate 
the  courtesy.  And  the  charge  of  close  communion  is  no 
more  applicable  to  the  Baptists  than  to  us. — Dr.  Hibbard, 
Methodist. 

Open  communion  is  an  absurdity  when  it  means  commun- 
ion with  the  unbaptized.  I  would  not  for  a  moment  con- 
sider a  proposition  to  admit  an  unbaptized  person  to  the 
communion,  and  can  I  ask  a  Baptist  so  to  stultify  himself 
and  ignore  his  own  doctrine  as  to  ask  me  to  commune  with 
him  while  he  believes  I  am  unbaptized  ?  Let  us  have 
unity,  indeed,  but  not  at  the  expense  of  principle,  and  let 
us  not  ask  the  Baptist  to  ignore  or  be  inconsistent  with  his 
own  doctrine.  Neither  let  us  make  an  outcry  at  his  close 
communion,  which  is  but  faithfulness  to  principle,  until 
we  are  prepared  to  be  open  communists  ourselves,  from 
which  stupidity  may  we  be  forever  preserved. — American 
Presbyterian  Quarterly. 

Did  we  believe  that  only  believers  who  have  been  im- 
mersed are  baptized,  and  that  only  baptized  persons  have  a 
right  to  the  Lord's  table,  we  should  believe  and  practise 
strict  communion,  and  we  should  almost  consider  it  an  in- 
sult to  be  required  to  give  it  up  without  a  change  of  views 
on  the  subject  of  baptism.  .  .  We,  as  Pedobaptists,  are 
close  communionists,  and  we  hope  we  shall  never  cease  to  be 
such.  .  .  The  only  legitimate  subjects  of  controversy  be- 
tween us  and  the  Baptists  are  the  subjects  and  mode  of 
baptism.  —  Congregational  Journal. 

FIGURATIVE    ALLUSIONS. 

Jesus'  baptism  of  sorrow  was  not  a  mere  sprin- 
kling ;  it  was  a  submersion  in  the  tide  of  suffering. 

L 


l62    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

When  some  good  man  prays  that  all  may  be  "  bap- 
tized" with  the  Holy  Ghost,  it  is  not  a  mere  sprin- 
kling that  he  desires,  but  an  inundation  of  the  blessed 
divine  influence.  When  some  one  writing  of  the 
great  war  says  that  the  land  was  "baptized  in  blood," 
he  means  not  that  it  was  merely  sprinkled,  but  that 
it  was  submerged,  as  it  were,  beneath  the  tide  of 
carnage.  Though  baptism  is  sometimes  spoken  of 
as  coming  through  an  outpouring,  the  idea  of  sub- 
mersion is  still  involved,  as  when  one  is  buried  by 
the  caving  in  of  a  bank  upon  him  or  buried  be- 
neath the  falling  snow.  Baptism,  then,  always 
means  immersion.  Immersion  is  not  merely  a 
"mode"  of  baptism — it  is  baptism  itself  To 
speak  of  baptism  by  sprinkling  is  like  talking  of 
dipping  by  sprinkling.  Pouring  or  sprinkling  is 
not  baptism  at  all ;  it  is  merely  something  which 
has  been  substituted  for  baptism.  Pouring  or 
sprinkling  cannot  properly  be  called  baptism,  ex- 
cept on  the  principle  by  which  the  name  of  an  ob- 
ject is  sometimes  given  to  that  which  is  put  in  its 
place.  Pouring  or  sprinkling  is  not  baptism,  and 
so  is  not  a  fulfillment  of  Christ's  command.  The 
command  to  be  baptized  is  a  command  to  be  im- 
mersed, and  this  is  another  reason  why  Baptists  do 
not  practise  pouring  or  sprinkling,  but  only  immer- 
sion. 

In  a  revival  in  the  winter  of  1863-64,  as  stated 
by  Rev.  Dr.  Norman  Fox,  in  one  of  the  regiments 
of  the  Sixth  Corps,  a  young  sergeant  who  had 
been  converted  was  told   by  the  chaplain  that  he 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  1 63 

ought  to  be  baptized.  "Very  well,"  said  he,  "if 
that  is  'reg'lations.' "  It  was  a  soldier's  answer. 
A  soldier  is  trained  to  obey  orders,  and  if  Christ, 
his  captain,  commanded  him  to  be  immersed,  the 
boy  was  ready  to  obey.  And  so  Baptists  adhere 
to  the  practice  of  immersion,  for  they  believe  that 
that  is  Scripture  "reg'lations."  It  is  objected  by 
some  that  this  is  mere  literalism  ;  that,  granting 
that  baptism  is  strictly  immersion,  and  that  immer- 
sion alone  was  practised  in  the  earliest  times,  yet  the 
idea  of  baptism  is  that  of  washing  or  purification, 
and  as  washing  is  attained  by  pouring  or  sprin- 
kling as  well  as  by  immersion,  these  are  in  substance 
a  compliance  with  the  command,  and  in  spirit  are 
a.  fulfillment  of  the  ordinance.  But  can  baptism 
be  regarded  as  merely  a  purification?  Jesus'  bap- 
tism of  sorrow  was  not  a  purification,  for  the  Holy 
One  needed  no  such.  Many  of  the  Fathers  re- 
ferred the  baptism  of  fire  to  the  destruction  of  the 
wicked,  which  they  viewed,  not  as  a  purification, 
but  a  submersion  in  waves  of  fire.  Should  we 
grant  that  the  original  idea  in  baptism  was  a  puri- 
fication, it  still  remains  that  the  apostles  in  their 
mention  of  baptism  into  the  death  of  Christ  at- 
tribute to  baptism  the  symbolism  of  death  to  sin 
and  a  rising  again  to  a  new  life  through  faith  in 
Jesus,  who  was  buried  and  rose  again.  The  apos- 
tolic immersion,  then,  was  a  symbol  of  burial  and 
resurrection.  Referring  to  this  fact,  Luther  says  : 
"  On  this  account  I  could  wish  that  such  as  are 
baptized    should    be   immersed    in   the  water.     It 


164    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

would  be  beautiful  to  have  so  full  and  perfect  a 
sign  of  so  perfect  and  full  a  thing ;  as  also  without 
doubt  it  was  instituted  by  Christ."  Pouring  and 
sprinkling  cannot  be  regarded  as  meeting  even  the 
spirit  and  idea  of  the  baptismal  command,  for  they 
contain  no  symbol  of  the  death  and  resurrection 
of  our  Lord,  which  idea  is  paramount  in  apostolic 
baptism.  The  act  of  washing  contains  nothing 
whatever  of  distinctively  Christian  symbolism,  for 
it  is  found  in  the  Jewish  "Ritual,"  nay,  in  purely 
heathen  ceremonies.  Only  a  burial  in  water  can 
be  regarded  as  true  Christian  baptism,  for  it  alone 
sets  forth  the  death  and  resurrection  of  our  Lord, 
which  is  the  central  fact  of  the  Christian  system. 
Not  only  the  letter,  then,  but  also  the  spirit  of  the 
baptismal  command  requires  that  there  should  be 
an  immersion. 

It  is  urged  that  baptism  is  only  a  form.  Yes, 
and  so  a  flag  is  only  a  form,  merely  a  piece  of 
bunting,  and  yet  men  will  die  for  it.  The  United 
States  flag  is  a  symbol  of  the  Union,  since  it  has  a 
star  for  every  State.  When  the  great  conflict  arose 
in  1 861,  it  was  seen  in  a  moment  that  if  disunion 
came  the  flag  would  have  to  be  changed.  The  con- 
test therefore  took  the  shape  as  to  whether  the  old 
flag  should  be  retained.  And  when  the  "Star 
Spangled  Banner"  was  sung,  when  the  Stars  and 
Stripes  were  unfurled  to  the  breeze,  it  meant  that 
there  was  to  be  no  change  in  that  flag. 

That  great  four  years'  war  was  a  war  over  a  flag, 
for  to  save  the  flag  meant  to  save  the  Union.     If  the 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  1 65 

flag  had  been  the  French  Tri-color,  or  the  Swiss 
Cross,  which  could  have  been  retained  after  the 
Nation  was  divided,  it  would  have  been  different. 
But  the  fact  that  if  disunion  came  the  flag  would 
have  to  be  changed,  made  the  soldier  "fight  for 
the  flag"  and  "stand  by  the  flag"  with  ten-fold 
earnestness.  Perhaps  it  would  not  be  too  much  to 
say  that  the  flag  saved  the  nation.  Perhaps  it  would 
not  have  been  possible  to  save  the  Union  had  it 
not  been  for  the  flag,  which  put  the  whole  question 
before  the  minds  of  the  people  in  so  vivid  and 
striking  a  way  that  they  could  not  help  seeing  the 
meaning  of  the  great  struggle.  The  flag,  though 
a  "mere  form,"  had  a  marvelous  power,  for  it  told 
the  whole  story  of  loyalty,  of  patriotism,  and  of 
heroic  consecration. 

And  so  the  baptismal  burial  in  water,  though  a 
mere  ceremony,  sets  forth  so  strikingly  the  great 
central  truth  of  Christianity  that  eternal  life  comes 
through  the  death  and  resurrection  of  Christ,  that 
Baptists  in  preserving  that  symbol  are  doing  a  rich 
service  to  the  church  and  the  world. 

There  is  another  point  to  which  reference  has 
been  made  already  and  regarding  which  testimony 
has  been  offered,  but  to  which  perhaps  an  addi- 
tional word  should  be  given,  a  matter  on  which  the 
Baptists  have  been  subjected  to  much  ignorant  and 
most  unjust  criticism,  namely  what  is  known  as 
close  communion.  On  this  subject,  let  it  first  be 
noticed,  as  already  taught  by  liberal  quotations, 
that  all  Christians,  Presbyterians  and  Methodists  as 


1 66    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

well  as  Baptists,  agree  that  baptism  is  a  prerequi- 
site to  the  communion  ;  that  no  person  should  be 
invited  to  the  communion  table  until  he  has  been 
baptized.  When  therefore  the  question  arises, 
Who  shall  be  invited  to  the  communion  table?  it 
must  first  be  determined,  Who  has  been  baptized? 
If  a  man  has  been  baptized  who  has  merely  been 
sprinkled  in  unconscious  infancy,  then  he  may  be 
invited  to  the  communion.  But  Baptists  find  in 
Scripture  no  baptism  except  a  burial  in  water  on 
profession  of  faith.  And  so  they  can  invite  only 
immersed  believers.  Unable  to  see  that  infant 
sprinkling  is  baptism,  they  cannot  invite  to  the 
communion  those  who  have  been  baptized  in  in- 
fancy, or  have  received  merely  pouring  or  sprin- 
kling for  baptism.  Baptists  differ  from  Presbyte- 
rians and  Methodists  not  on  the  question,  who  shall 
be  invited  to  the  communion  ?  but  simply  as  to, 
who  have  been  baptized  ?  If  Baptists  are  wrong  in 
saying  that  infant  sprinkling  is  not  baptism,  then 
they  are  wrong  in  not  inviting  Presbyterians  and 
Methodists  to  the  communion.  But  if  they  have  a 
right  to  their  opinion  that  Presbyterians  and  Meth- 
odists have  not  been  baptized,  they  are  right  in  not 
inviting  them  to  the  Lord's  Supper. 

It  is  true  that  Spurgeon,  under  certain  restric- 
tions, and  English  Baptists  generally,  so  invite 
Presbyterians  and  others  to  the  communion.  But 
on  what  ground  ?  On  a  ground  which  Presbyte- 
rians and  all  others  condemn,  the  ground  that 
water  baptism  is  not  in  any  way  a  prerequisite  to 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  1 6/ 

the  communion  ;  on  the  ground  that  it  is  proper  to 
invite  a  man  who  has  never  received  any  water 
baptism  whatever,  neither  immersion  nor  pouring 
nor  sprinkling.  Now,  when  Presbyterians  them- 
selves condemn  this  principle  of  the  English  Bap- 
tists, how^  absurd  in  them  to  censure  American 
Baptists  for  not  adopting  it.  For  Presbyterians  to 
say  that  none  but  baptized  persons  should  be  in- 
vited to  the  communion,  and  then  to  blame  the 
Baptists  for  not  inviting  them,  is  to  say  that  Bap- 
tists have  no  right  to  consider  them  unbaptized  ; 
that  Baptists  have  no  right  to  the  opinion  that 
there  is  no  baptism  but  immersion  on  profession  of 
faith — in  other  words,  that  Baptists  have  no  right 
to  be  Baptists.  But  the  Baptists  answer,  "When 
you  show  us  that  baptism  in  infancy  or  a  mere 
sprinkling  is  true  baptism,  then  we  will  regard  you 
as  baptized,  and  will  invite  you  to  the  communion  ; 
but  so  long  as  we  find  in  Scripture  no  baptism  but 
immersion  on  profession  of  faith,  which  you  have 
not  received,  we  must  regard  you  as  unbaptized, 
and,  on  your  own  doctrine  that  baptism  must  pre- 
cede the  Lord's  Supper,  we  are  unable  to  invite 
you." 

GROWTH    OF    BAPTISTS. 

As  to  the  growth  of  the  Baptist  denomination,  it 
may  be  remarked  that  in  1750,  a  century  after  its 
rise  in  this  country,  there  were  only  some  sixty 
churches,  with  not  many  more  than  five  thousand 
members.     Then  came  the  great  revival  under  Ed- 


l6S    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

wards  and  Whitefield,  which,  as  has  been  re- 
marked, was  preached  strictly  on  Baptist  Hnes,  and 
in  1768,  nearly  eighteen  years  later,  there  were  re- 
ported one  hundred  and  thirty-seven  churches,  an 
increase  of  more  than  one  hundred  and  twenty-five 
per  cent.  Twenty-two  years  after  that,  in  1790, 
there  were  reported  eight  hundred  and  seventy-two 
churches,  with  about  sixty-five  thousand  members. 
Twenty-two  years  later,  in  181 2,  were  reported  two 
thousand  six  hundred  and  thirty-three  churches, 
with  two  hundred  and  four  thousand  one  hundred 
and  eighty-five  members.  In  1848  the  Baptists  of 
the  United  States  numbered  about  seven  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand.  They  now  number  over  three 
millions,  while  in  Great  Britain  and  on  the  conti- 
nent of  Europe  and  in  mission  fields,  are  about 
three-quarters  of  a  million  more. 

A  hundred  years  ago  the  ratio  of  members  of 
Baptist  churches  to  the  entire  population  of  the 
United  States  was  one  to  sixty- three  ;  now  the  ra- 
tio is  one  to  twenty-one — that  is  to  say,  the  Bap- 
tists have  increased  faster  than  the  population,  and 
this  too  without  the  help  of  immigration.  Nearly 
all  immigrants  from  Europe  have  been  Roman 
Catholics  or  Lutherans.  The  Episcopalians  and 
Presbyterians  in  this  country  have  been  strength- 
ened by  immigration  from  Great  Britain,  but  not  so 
the  Baptists.  The  following  important  facts  have 
been  thus  tersely  stated  by  a  writer  already 
quoted:  "From  i860  to  1880  the  increase  in 
membership  of  four  of  our  leading  denominations 


HISTORIC    BAPTIST    PRINCIPLES  169 

was  this  :  Congregationalists,  forty-two  per  cent  ; 
Presbyterians,  fifty-five  per  cent.  ;  Methodist  Epis- 
copal, eighty-two  per  cent,  while  the  Baptist  de- 
nomination increased  ninety-nine  per  cent" 

On  this  subject  it  may  be  further  stated  that  in 
the  United  States  Baptists  numbered  in  1800,  one 
hundred  thousand;  in  1850,  six  hundred  and 
eighty-six  thousand  eight  hundred  and  seven  ;  in 
1870,  one  million  four  hundred  and  ten  thousand 
four  hundred  and  ninety-three;  1880,  two  million 
two  hundred  and  ninety-six  thousand  three  hundred 
and  twenty-seven;  in  1891,  three  million  one  hun- 
dred and  sixty-four  thousand  two  hundred  and 
twenty-seven.^ 

^  From  the  "  Baptist  Year-Book  "  for  1891,  the  subjoined  valua- 
ble and  interesting  statistics  concerning  the  progress  of  the  de- 
nomination during  the  past  year  have  been  compiled  : 

"There  are  in  the  United  States  1,382  Associations,  which 
comprise  34,780  churches,  with  an  aggregate  membership  of 
3,164,227,  an  increase  over  last  year  of  29  Associations,  1,192 
churches  and  94,180  members.  The  total  number  of  baptisms 
reported  for  the  year  was  140,058,  and  the  deaths  27,277.  The 
total  amount  reported  as  contributed  for  home  expenses  is  ^7, 186,- 
532  ;  for  missions,  ^1,045,371  ;  for  education,  $374,039  ;  and  for 
miscellaneous  religious  and  benevolent  objects,  $2,609,637,  mak- 
ing a  total  of  $11,215,579.  The  total  value  of  church  property 
reported  is  $61,646,377.  There  are  22,703  ordained  ministers, 
an  increase  of  1,528.  There  are  18,555  Sunday-schools,  with 
131,889  officers  and  teachers,  and  1,280,663  scholars,  an  increase 
of  859  schools  and  78,967  scholars." 

It  is  deeply  interesting  to  put  after  the  figures  just  given  a  par- 
tial summary  of  statistics  for  1896  :  Associations,  1,567 ; 
churches,  40,658;  total  membership,  3,824,038;  value  of  church 
property,  $84,039,959.  Our  numbers,  doubtless,  will  be  over  four 
millions  before  the  century  shall  close. 


I/O    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Baptists  have  had  and  still  have  a  high  and  holy 
mission.  God  has  greatly  honored  our  imperfect 
services  both  in  the  home  and  foreign  fields.  He 
graciously  condescends  to  work  with  us  and  to 
permit  us  to  work  with  him,  in  wonderful  ways. 
May  we  evermore  be  true  to  our  high  calling,  loyal 
to  our  Lord,  and  beneficent  to  the  whole  world. 


VII 

PARTIAL  UNIFICATION  BY  POSSIBLE 
ELIMINATION 

ON  few  subjects  is  there  more  reasonless  writing 
than  on  that  of  church  unity.  It  is  often 
difficult  to  determine  what  those  who  write  and  speak 
freely  on  this  subject  really  mean.  But  it  is  not  at  all 
difficult  to  know  what  is  meant  by  Christian  union. 
We  are  all  quite  ready  to  admit  that  it  consists  in 
a  common  spirit,  a  common  aim,  a  common  hope, 
and  a  common  method.  Anything  that  partakes 
of  the  spirit  of  bitterness,  selfishness,  and  mere 
denominational  success,  is  opposed  to  this  admir- 
able aim. 

But  church  unity  must  in  some  way  involve  the 
idea  of  the  merging  of  all  churches  into  one  church. 
When  we  analyze  the  speeches  and  articles  of  many 
of  the  advocates  of  church  unity,  we  find  as  a  rule 
that  they  mean  to  ask  all  other  churches  to  join  the 
particular  church  to  which  the  writer  or  speaker 
belongs.  They  ask  that  each  church  should  sur- 
render its  distinctive  views  and  unite  in  some 
common  body,  at  the  expense  of  cherished   con- 

1  Delivered  March  24,  1890,  at  Lenox  Lyceum,  New  York,  at 
the  first  Interdenominational  Social  Union  of  the  Congregational 
Club,  and  the  Baptist,  Methodist,  and  Presb3'teriaa  Unions  of  New 
York. 

171 


1/2    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

victions  and  intelligent  interpretations  of  the  word 
of  God.  They  ask  that  some  churches  should 
believe  in  so-called  infant  baptism,  while  these 
churches  firmly  believe  that  this  rite  has  no  warrant 
either  in  Holy  Scripture  or  in  common  sense. 
They  ask  that  certain  other  churches  should  adopt 
a  Presbyterian  or  an  Episcopal  form  of  church 
government,  when  these  churches  believe  only  in 
the  Congregational  form  of  government ;  or  they 
ask  those  who  believe  in  Presbyterial  or  Prelatical 
forms  to  adopt  a  Congregational  form.  Really,  it 
seems  difficult  to  give  some  of  the  advocates  of 
church  unity  credit  for  both  sincerity  and  intelli- 
gence. 

I  certainly  am  not  one  of  those  who  mourn  over 
what  some  persons  call  "the  scandal  of  a  divided 
Christendom."  In  a  real  sense  the  church  is  not 
divided  to-day.  There  are  various  divisions  of 
Christians,  but  even  in  their  organic  divisions  the 
essential  unity  of  the  faith  is  illustrated.  Those 
who  are  most  vigorously  crying  out  for  unity  awaken 
often  the  suspicion  that  they  are  asking  for  that 
which  they  know  they  themselves  conspicuously 
lack.  There  may  be  organic  without  essential 
union.  There  are  churches  in  this  city  at  this  mo- 
ment, bearing  the  same  denominational  name,  recit- 
ing the  same  denominational  creeds,  and  are  yet 
wider  apart  in  spirit  and  method  than  churches  which 
bear  different  denominational  names.  Churches 
which  are  under  one  denominational  control  are 
illustrating  some  of  the  characteristics  of  Romanism, 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION        1 73 

while  others  are  manifesting  marked  features  of 
rationahsm.  There  is  more  essential  unity  among 
us  than  we  ourselves  at  all  times  appreciate.  Let 
some  crisis  arise  when  Protestantism  must  utter  its 
voice,  and  all  our  churches  will  stand  together  as 
one  undivided  church  of  Christ. 

What  great  gain  would  come  to  the  cause  of  God 
as  a  whole  if  all  churches  were  united  into  one 
great  church?  Would  such  a  union  give  real  unity 
in  faith  and  work?  No  intelligent  man  can  so 
affirm.  Churches  belonging  to  the  same  body  soon 
form  affiliations  within  themselves  on  the  basis  of 
creedal  interpretations,  or  because  of  social  affini- 
ties. There  is  comparatively  little  real  unity  to-day 
in  the  Roman  Church.  Protestant  denominations 
have  not  in  recent  years  been  so  bitter  against  one 
another  as  have  different  wings  within  the  Roman 
Church.  These  differences  have  marked  this  church 
throughout  its  history ;  it  has  occasionally  persecu- 
ted even  its  own  members.  The  burning  jealousies 
and  personal  rivalries  shut  up  within  this  church 
occasionally  burst  forth,  to  the  scandal  of  the  church 
catholic  itself  and  of  the  Christian  name.  The  dif- 
ferences between  the  Jesuits  and  the  Jansenists  are 
known  to  all  readers  of  church  history  and  general 
literature  ;  the  same  remark  applies  in  part  to  other 
orders  within  this  same  church.  The  bitterness  in 
the  former  case  was  almost  entirely  on  the  side  of 
the  Jesuits ;  in  those  controversies  they  were  true  to 
their  general  character.  The  Jansenists  were  vari- 
ously and  always  cruelly  persecuted. 


1/4    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

Our  Protestant  brethren  sometimes  glorify  Ro- 
manism at  the  expense  of  Protestantism,  because 
it  is  beheved  that  the  former  is  united  while  the 
latter  is  divided.  We  claim,  however,  that  there 
is  as  much  essential  unity  in  the  Protestant  denomi- 
nations as  there  is  between  the  different  wings  in 
the  Roman  Church.  These  organizations  are  prac- 
tically different  denominations  acting  in  conjunction 
within  the  Roman  Church.  The  jealousies  and 
contentions  which  have  at  times  marked  the  Fran- 
ciscans, Augustinians,  and  other  societies,  brother- 
hoods, and  still  other  divisions  in  this  church,  have 
helped  Protestantism,  and  in  many  other  ways  are 
among  the  historical  causes  of  great  religious  move- 
ments. Let  us  in  our  desire  for  still  greater  union 
neither  deny  nor  disparage  the  union  which  now 
exists,  and  for  which  we  now  in  many  ways  lift  up 
our  hearts  in  thanksgiving  to  Jesus  Christ,  the  great 
Head  of  the  one  glorious  church.  The  differences 
in  the  Presbyterian  Church  in  America  at  this  mo- 
ment are  known  to  all  men ;  they  are  more  bitter 
than  are  any  of  the  relations  of  the  Presbyterian 
Church  to  any  other  Protestant  body.  The  differ- 
ences between  various  wings  of  the  Episcopal  Church 
are  also  well  known ;  indeed,  they  caused,  a  few 
years  ago,  a  schism  in  that  body. 

Would  such  unity,  as  some  desire,  secure  sound- 
ness of  doctrines  ?  Who  can  intelligently  so  affirm  ? 
The  bodies  possessing  what  are  often  called  the 
"long  and  strong  creeds,"  are  the  very  bodies  whose 
various  parties  differ  most  widely  on  points  of  doc- 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION        1/5 

trines.  Thus,  as  we  have  seen,  Rationalism  and 
Romanism  can  be  found  side  by  side  under  the 
same  ecclesiastical  name,  and  repeating  the  same 
ecclesiastical  creeds.  Creeds  are  not  conservative 
of  sound  doctrines;  indeed,  the  historic  creeds  have 
often  been  divisive  rather  than  unitive.  The  Nicene 
Creed  did  not  secure  purity  of  doctrine ;  for  a  time 
Arianismwas  stimulated  by  the  excitements  growing 
out  of  the  council  at  Nicaea.  It  would  be  easy  to 
enlarge  upon  the  historical  illustrations  of  this 
statement.  The  differences  between  denominations, 
so  long  as  a  kindly  and  Christian  spirit  is  preserved, 
are  no  reproach  to  the  church  of  Christ.  Absolute 
unity  of  opinion  can  be  found  only  among  dead 
men ;  living  men  must  think  for  themselves.  We 
cannot  pin  the  faith  of  to-day  to  the  creeds  of 
fallible  men  who  died  hundreds  of  years  ago.  It 
is  no  reproach  to  Christian  men  that  they  differ 
kindly  in  interpretations  of  Scripture  and  in  forms 
of  worship. 

Would  the  church  unity,  for  which  some  plead, 
give  aggressiveness  to  missionary  work?  Surely  he 
is  a  reckless  man  who  would  so  affirm.  The  unity 
of  Christ  may  be  made  the  more  perfect  in  our 
apparent  divisions ;  and  it  is  certain  that  our  dif- 
ferent missionary  organizations  have  been  able  to 
accomplish  far  more  in  foreign  mission  work,  labor- 
ing along  their  separate  lines,  than  all  could  have 
accomplished  as  one  organic  body.  During  this 
century  these  organizations  have  put  one  hundred 
and  forty-six  foreign  missionary  societies  into  the 


176    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

field.  They  have  translated  the  Scriptures  into  two 
hundred  and  eighty  languages  or  dialects ;  they 
have  reached  nine-tenths  of  the  entire  race  with 
the  word  of  God ;  they  have  divided  their  forces 
so  that  forty  societies  are  working  in  India,  thirty- 
three  in  China,  and  thirty-four  in  Africa.  No 
reasonable  man  would  claim  that  one-tenth  of  this 
force  would  now  be  at  work  in  foreign  lands  if  all 
these  denominations  were  under  the  direction  of 
one  organic  body.  Why  will  men  talk  about  a 
divided  Christendom?  Why  will  they  shout  them- 
selves hoarse  over  a  formal  and  mechanical  church 
unity?  We  have  true  union  just  in  proportion  as 
we  have  the  spirit  of  Christ.  Every  man  who  has 
been  washed  in  the  precious  blood  of  the  Son  of 
God  is  our  blood  relation  ;  it  matters  not  whether 
he  is  black  or  white,  red  or  yellow,  rich  or  poor ; 
whether  he  is  a  member  of  this  church  or  that,  in 
a  very  real  sense  he  is  our  brother. 

Would  such  church  unity  lead  to  increased  loyalty 
to  the  word  and  to  the  Son  of  God?  This  is  a 
most  practical  question.  When  the  church  was 
practically  a  unit  over  the  whole  world  it  was  sunk 
in  the  greatest  intellectual  ignorance  and  moral 
corruption.  The  true  life  of  Christ  in  those  days 
was  found  outside  the  so-called  church.  Loyalty 
to  Jesus  Christ  is  to  be  maintained  at  all  hazards. 
It  is  admitted  that  our  present  divisions  sometimes 
cause  a  waste  of  money  and  effort  in  missionary 
operations ;  that  in  many  Western  towns  and  vil- 
lages several  churches  are  struggling  to  live  where 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION        1 7/ 

one  could  meet  the  religious  wants  of  all  the  peo- 
ple. Evils  of  this  character  are  readily  admitted. 
But  they  are  incidental  to  the  weakness  and  ambi- 
tion of  unsanctified  human  nature.  It  is  possible  to 
suggest  some  principles  according  to  which  union 
between  such  struggling  bodies  might  be  formed, 
and  also  to  state  some  creedal  basis  for  such  union. 

In  the  meantime,  let  us  put  the  name  of  Jesus 
Christ  above  all  mere  human  names.  The  oneness 
for  which  our  blessed  Lord  prayed  is  not  neces- 
sarily realized  in  the  church  unity  so  often  com- 
mended. His  prayer  referred  to  essential  rather 
than  to  organic  union.  It  was  not  a  prayer  for 
absolute  unity  of  opinion  in  matters  of  faith  and 
practice.  It  was  not  a  prayer  that  men  should  be 
silent  when  error  is  taught ;  but  it  was  rather  a 
prayer  for  a  union  in  love,  and  its  standard  is  the 
relations  between  the  persons  of  the  blessed  Trinity. 
That  relation  suggests  union  in  spirit  with  diversity 
of  existences.  This  is  as  near  as  churches  can  ever 
come  to  the  unity  existing  in  the  Godhead.  It  is 
unity  in  love,  and  such  unity  the  churches  of  Jesus 
Christ  now,  to  a  great  degree,  manifest. 

Organic  union  among  the  various  churches  is 
certainly  not  feasible  at  present.  The  recent  arti- 
cles in  the  "Independent"  by  bishops  of  the 
Protestant  Episcopal  Church  clearly  show  that 
these  bishops  are  not  prepared  to  recognize 
churches  of  other  denominations  as  churches  of 
Christ.  Their  letters  are  candid  and  courteous  ; 
but  as   regards  such  recognition,  they  are  narrow 


1/8    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and  unfraternal.  These  writers  insist  upon  the 
historic  episcopate  as  an  institution  which  must  be 
recognized  by  the  ministry  of  all  other  churches. 
They  will  not  surrender  their  convictions  regarding 
the  alleged  divine  appointment  of  the  historic 
episcopate.  Other  churches  will  not  so  dishonor 
themselves  as  to  admit  that  they  are  not  complete 
and  competent  churches  of  Jesus  Christ,  although 
they  recognize  the  historic  episcopate  as  historically 
untrue  and  doctrinally  useless.  Doctrinally,  the 
Protestant  Episcopal  Church  is  broad  and  liberal ; 
but  in  matters  of  traditional  order  it  is  surprisingly 
narrow  and  illiberal.  Its  narrowness  in  the  one 
case  is  quite  as  remarkable  as  is  its  broadness  in  the 
other.  It  is  inexplicable  that  mere  questions  of 
polity  should  be  so  highly  esteemed,  while  ques- 
tions of  doctrine  are  practically  so  lightly  regarded. 
But  even  though  there  may  not  be  organic  there 
may  be  essential  union  between  churches  of  differ- 
ent denominations. 

On  the  whole  subject  of  union  several  proposi- 
tions may  be  laid  down,  which,  if  accepted,  would 
greatly  help  in  the  solution  of  perplexing  practical 
problems  in  Christian  work. 

PRACTICAL   PROPOSITIONS. 

I.  The  famous  dictum  of  Chillingworth  is  to  be 
emphasized — the  Bible,  and  the  Bible  only,  the 
religion  of  Protestants.  Recently  I  was  asked  to 
give  my  endorsement  to  the  statement  that  the 
Bible  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  ultimate  authority  in 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION        1 79 

all  questions  of  faith  and  practice  ;  that  statement 
is  not  satisfactory.  The  Bible  ought  to  be  consid- 
ered of  greater  authority  in  all  questions  of  faith 
and  practice  than  that  statement  implies.  This 
truth  is  to  be  insisted  upon  first  and  last  and 
always.  Many,  however,  who  are  nominally  Prot- 
estants, hesitate  to  accept  the  Bible  except  as  a 
very  vague  authority  in  religious  belief  They  give 
tradition  and  "  churchianity "  an  authority  which 
the  word  of  God  nowhere  recognizes ;  and  an 
authority  which,  to  some  degree,  displaces  and 
quite  disparages  the  word  of  God  as  the  only 
standard  of  faith.  When  the  Bible  speaks  we  may 
not  be  silent ;  when  the  Bible  is  silent  we  may  not 
speak.  Here  and  here  alone  is  sufficient  authority 
for  our  guidance  in  life,  our  hope  in  death,  our  joy 
in  eternity.  More  and  more  must  the  word  of  God 
be  exalted  to  the  supreme  place  in  the  church  of 
God,  as  the  true  guide  alike  in  faith  and  practice. 
All  recent  discussions  tend  more  and  more  to 
weaken  the  authority  of  creeds  made  by  men,  and 
more  and  more  to  exalt  the  simple  and  sublime 
authority  of  this  divine  book.  By  this  book  we  are 
to  live  ;  by  it  we  are  to  triumph  here,  and  by  it  we 
are  to  be  judged  hereafter.  This  proposition  must 
be  fundamental  in  any  intelligent  and  enduring 
organic  union  of  churches. 

2.  Another  proposition  is  this  :  No  denomination 
has  a  right  to  a  separate  existence  unless  it  repre- 
sents and  teaches  some  important  doctrine  or  doc- 
trines of  the  word  of  God  which  other  denomina- 


l80    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tions  either  oppose,  reject,  or  inadequately  present. 
Surely  that  is  a  reasonable  proposition.  No  de- 
nomination has  a  right  to  exist  as  such,  if  it  has  no 
distinctive  truth  to  teach  to  the  world  ;  it  has  no 
right  to  exist  merely  to  gratify  the  personal  vanity  of 
its  supporters,  or  to  furnish  a  vocation  for  its  preach- 
ers ;  and  no  right  to  exist  merely  to  maintain  a 
tradition,  however  honorable  and  venerable.  The 
question  must  be  asked,  What  truth  has  this  organ- 
ization to  give  us  which  other  bodies  of  Christians 
do  not  teach  ?  That  is  a  fair  question  ;  and  to  it 
each  denomination,  with  the  word  of  God  as  its 
authority,  ought  to  give  an  intelligent  reply.  In 
the  British  Government  there  are  officers  and 
offices  which  exist  simply  as  souvenirs  of  an  earlier 
time  and  of  a  different  civilization.  The  necessity 
for  these  officers  has  entirely  passed  away  ;  but 
they  still  remain,  as  strange  examples  of  a  con- 
servatism which  remembers  everything  old  and 
which  learns  nothing  new.  It  ought  not  to  be  so 
in  the  church  of  Christ.  The  church  ought  not  to 
care  especially  whether  any  practice  is  old  or  new  ; 
but  whether,  according  to  God's  word,  it  is  true 
and  necessary.  The  true  apostolic  church  is  that 
church  which  best  illustrates  the  spirit  and  teach- 
ings of  the  apostles,  that  church  whose  ordinances 
and  worship  most  fully  harmonize  with  the  teach- 
ings and  example  of  the  apostles.  True  apostol- 
icity  is  not  in  an  imaginary  succession,  but  in  actual 
possession. 

Why  waste  the   Lord's  money  in  maintaining  a 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION       l8l 

separate  organization  for  home  and  foreign  mission 
work,  unless  the  particular  body  has  a  truth  to 
teach  which  other  churches  are  not  presenting  to 
the  world?  It  is  fair  to  ask  regarding  some 
churches  this  question  :  What  truth  of  God's  word 
would  perish  from  the  earth  if  these  churches  should 
cease  to  exist  as  separate  bodies  ?  In  regard  to 
some  organizations  it  must  be  said  that  the  echo  of 
the  questioner's  voice  will  be  the  only  answer  to 
his  question.  Why  then  should  separate  organiza- 
tions be  maintained?  Why  should  not  the  advo- 
cates of  organic  Christian  union  give  their  atten- 
tion at  once  to  this  matter  ?  Why  might  not  some 
of  them  who  talk  much  of  union  immediately  illus- 
trate their  preaching  by  merging  themselves  and 
their  churches  into  other  Christian  bodies  which 
teach,  in  all  essential  respects,  the  doctrines  which 
their  own  church  teaches  ?  If  we  honestly  apply 
this  rule  we  shall  certainly  eliminate  several  de- 
nominations. It  would  not  be  difficult,  but  it 
might  not  be  gracious,  to  name  the  bodies  to 
which  these  principles  might  apply,  and  which 
would  be  thus  eliminated.  The  question  is.  Are 
these  principles  sound,  and  if  so,  ought  they  not  to 
be  applied  in  the  interest  of  true  economy  in  the 
conduct  of  the  Lord's  work,  and  also  in  the  inter- 
est of  a  wholesome  Christian  union  ? 

3.  Akin  to  this  last  proposition  is  another : 
Organic  union  ought  first  to  be  effected  among  all 
the  wings  and  branches  of  each  denomination  itself 
When  that  has  been  accomplished,  that  denomina- 


1 82    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tion  can  consistently  and  effectively  urge  organic 
union  among  the  various  bodies  differing  much 
more  widely  in  name,  in  faith,  and  in  forms  of  wor- 
ship. Let  us  begin  with  the  Baptist  denomination. 
There  are  Regular  Baptists  and  many  sorts  of 
irregular  Baptists.  Irregular  Baptists  are  divided 
into  many  different  bodies  of  greater  or  less  im- 
portance. Dr.  Carroll,  in  his  admirable  volume, 
"  The  Religious  Forces  of  the  United  States,"  gives 
us  a  very  large  number  of  subdivisions  in  the  Bap- 
tist body.  A  more  careful  classification  than  Dr. 
Carroll  makes  would  considerably  reduce  the 
number  ;  but  admitting  that  fact,  we  know  that 
the  number  is  still  needlessly  large.  Similar  re- 
marks will  apply  to  his  classification  of  the  Meth- 
odist and  the  Presbyterian  churches  and  to  still 
other  bodies.  But  in  their  cases  also  the  existing 
subdivisions  are  needlessly  large,  and  should  be 
promptly  and  greatly  reduced. 

Regular  Baptists  feel  that  they  ought,  if  possible, 
to  secure  union  among  some  of  these  divisions  and 
subdivisions,  although  in  the  case  of  some,  such 
union  is  probably  impossible.  They  ought  to 
begin  near  home,  and  later  they  could  consistently 
urge  bodies  differing  more  widely  to  come  into  a 
closer  union.  Regular  Baptists  express  this  desire 
more  for  the  sake  of  those  outside  their  special 
lines  than  for  their  own  sake  ;  they  increase  every 
year  more  than  the  entire  number  of  several  of 
these  divisions  and  subdivisions.  Baptists  feel  that 
without  doing  violence  to  any  one's  convictions  of 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION        1 83 

the  teachings  of  God's  word,  it  would  be  a  great 
gain  to  have  a  Pan-Baptist  union  organization  in 
which  all  Baptists  could  unite  for  more  effective 
work  in  the  conversion  of  the  world  at  home  and 
abroad. 

Similar  remarks  will  apply  to  the  Presbyterian 
Church.  The  distinctions  between  Old  School  and 
New  School  have,  at  least  nominally,  passed  away. 
Traces,  however,  of  former  divisions  still  remain  ; 
but  there  are  still  many  branches  of  the  one  Pres- 
byterian Church.  If  one  were  to  speak  of  the  Re- 
formed (Dutch)  Church  in  this  connection  the  argu- 
ment would  be  greatly  strengthened.  It  would 
seem  as  if  all  these  bodies  which  are  Presbyterian 
in  government,  and  which  differ  so  little  in  faith 
and  practice,  might  be  brought  into  one  great  Pan- 
Presbyterian  Church.  There  are  also  various  bodies 
of  Christians  bearing  the  name  Methodist.  We 
have  Episcopal  Methodists,  Wesleyan  Methodists, 
Calvinistic  Methodists,  and  Protestant  Methodists, 
and  many  other  kinds  of  Methodists  ;  and  some  of 
these  divisions  are  also  subdivided  again  and  again. 
Let  us  have  a  great  Pan-Methodist  organization, 
and  then  Methodism  shall  be  able  more  effectively 
to  make  its  appeal  to  other  bodies  not  bearing  its 
distinctive  name.  Congregationalists  also  have  dif- 
ferent wings.  The  line  of  cleavage  may  not  be 
clearly  marked  by  a  separate  terminology,  but  it  is 
marked  by  differences  in  faith  and  practice  which 
cannot  well  be  formulated  into  differences  in 
nomenclature.       These    differences,    however,    are 


184    CURRENT   QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

real ;  they  are  manifesting  themselves  in  theological 
schools,  in  home  missions,  and  especially  in  the 
Board  for  foreign  mission  work. 

When  we  come  to  speak  of  the  Protestant  Epis- 
copal Church  we  find  many  illustrations  of  the 
necessity  which  there  is  of  such  a  denominational 
unity  as  is  here  advocated.  There  are  in  this  body 
very  wide  differences  in  the  essential  spirit  of  differ- 
ent churches.  There  is  the  High  Church,  at  times 
almost  similar  to  the  Roman,  and  there  is  the  Low 
Church  and  the  Broad  Church,  differing  very 
widely.  There  are  Reformed  Episcopalians,  and, 
in  the  opinion  of  these  at  least,  Un-Reformed 
Episcopalians.  There  ought  to  be  a  Pan-Episcopal 
Church — which  might,  perhaps,  include  other 
bodies  so  far  as  the  term  Episcopal  is  concerned 
— before  the  most  effective  form  of  appeal  can  be 
made  for  organic  unity  to  those  outside  the  Protes- 
tant Episcopal  fold.  We  trust  the  effort  toward  a 
more  permanent  unity  will  be  begun  along  all  these 
denominational  lines. 

4.  Another  proposition  it  may  be  permitted  to 
suggest :  No  form  of  organic  union  is  to  be  advo- 
cated which  gives  to  any  church  the  right  to  appro- 
priate for  itself  such  ecclesiastical  titles,  or  to  em- 
ploy such  historical  assumptions,  as  practically  to 
unchurch  all  other  bodies  of  Christians.  No  titles 
should  be  used  by  any  church  except  such  as  are 
clearly  given  in  the  word  of  God,  and  they  are  to 
be  adopted  in  the  sense  in  which  they  are  used, 
according  to  the  conclusions  of  the  best  scholar- 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION        1 85 

ship,  in  the  word  of  God.  The  assumptions  which 
are  here  condemned  are  great  barriers  to  Christian 
union.  They  sometimes  simply  excite  laughter ; 
they  occasionally  justify  wholesome  indignation. 
No  officials  in  any  church  are  justified  in  appro- 
priating to  themselves  titles  implying  appointment 
by  authority  over  all  Christians  in  a  town,  city,  or 
State.  In  the  United  States  there  cannot  be  a 
bishop  of  New  York,  or  of  any  other  city.  No 
man  in  this  country  can  rightly  use  such  a  title. 

Several  denominations  use  such  titles  with  quali- 
fying terms  ;  but  two  bodies,  the  Roman  Catholic 
and  the  Episcopalian,  use  them  without  any  quali- 
fication. Such  assumptions  are  as  unfraternal  as 
they  are  unscriptural.  No  man  has  a  rigrht  to  use 
a  title  which  has  never  been  bestowed  by  those 
whose  bestowment  alone  could  justify  him  in  its 
use.  This  matter  is  extremely  important.  This 
misuse  of  titles  is  a  daily  violation  of  a  true  Chris- 
tian courtesy.  No  union  among  denominations, 
which  is  simply  absorption  of  one  into  another, 
except  in  the  case  of  denominations  which  have  no 
distinctive  truth  to  teach,  as  we  have  already  sug- 
gested, is  to  be  commended.  The  question  of 
legal  and  personal  rights  immediately  obtrudes 
itself  at  these  points.  The  lion  said  to  the  lamb, 
"Let  us  be  one  and  lie  down  together."  The 
union  was  speedily  effected,  but  when  the  attitude 
of  recumbency  was  secured,  the  relative  positions 
of  lion  and  lamb  it  is  easy  to  understand.  Such 
a  relationship  as  applied  to  churches  is  not  Chris- 


1 86    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tian  union  ;  it  is  simply  absorption  of  one  body 
into  another  without  real  advantage  to  the  cause 
of  Christ  as  a  whole.  There  must  be  fraternal 
consideration,  there  must  be  regard  for  the  rights 
of  all,  in  any  attempt  to  unite  the  different  denomi- 
nations into  one  great  whole.  The  assumptions 
which  we  here  condemn  are  a  great  barrier  to 
Christian  union,  and  are  subversive  of  all  true 
Christian  fraternity. 

ESSENTIAL    UNION    POSSIBLE. 

This  writer  has  not  advocated  organic  union,  but 
he  rejoices  in  all  forms  of  co-operation,  and  in  some 
forms  of  federation.  But  it  is  quite  certain  that  if 
there  is  to  be  any  form  of  organic  union,  it  must 
begin  at  the  baptistery.  Every  denomination  in 
Protestant  Christendom,  and  in  the  entire  range  of 
the  Roman  and  Greek  Churches,  can  agree  upon 
baptism,  as  taught  by  our  Lord  and  his  apostles. 
The  Greek  Church,  numbering  from  eighty  to 
ninety  millions  of  adherents,  has  ever  been  a  stout 
witness  on  behalf  of  baptism.  The  Roman  Church 
joyfully  accepts  it,  and  all  the  Protestant  churches 
join  hands  with  these  two  great  bodies.  On  no 
substitute  for  baptism,  such  as  pouring  or  sprin- 
kling, can  all  the  denominations  agree.  The  writer 
is  not  now  arguing  a  point ;  he  is  simply  stating  an 
incontrovertible  fact.  Do  men  really  want  organic 
Christian  union  ?  Are  they  in  earnest  when  they 
proclaim  this  desire  ?  Are  they  willing  to  follow 
Christ  into  the  waters  of  baptism  ?     Are  they  will- 


PARTIAL    UNIFICATION    BY    ELIMINATION        1 87 

ing  to  join  hands  with  their  brethren  in  all  cen- 
turies and  in  all  climes?  Here  is  the  opportunity; 
here  is  the  truly  apostolic  and  catholic  ordinance. 
If  they  will  but  follow  apostolic  injunction  and  ex- 
ample, then  all  can  say,  "We  are  buried  with  him 
by  baptism  into  death."  And  then  there  may  be, 
if  it  is  desired,  organic  union  without  doing  vio- 
lence to  the  convictions  of  any  and  in  acknowl- 
edged harmony  with  the  word  of  God  in  its  recog- 
nized interpretations. 

Organic  union  of  all  the  denominations,  as  mat- 
ters now  are,  is  perhaps  not  possible  ;  but  it  is 
easy  thus  to  state  the  manner  in  which  it  is  clearly 
possible.  It  would  be  easy  to  quote  the  most 
learned  authorities  of  many  faiths  and  countries 
and  centuries  in  favor  of  this  position.  On  but 
few  points  is  the  scholarship  of  the  world  so  nearly 
a  unit  as  it  is  in  regard  to  the  meaning  of  the 
word  "baptism,"  and  as  to  the  practice  of  the 
apostles  and  the  early  church.  It  would  be  easy 
to  fill  pages  with  the  names  of  learned  authorities 
on  all  these  points  ;  and  the  simple-minded  disciple 
of  the  Lord  Jesus,  with  no  guide  but  the  New 
Testament,  comes  to  the  same  conclusion  as  that 
reached  by  the  most  learned  scholars.  For  thir- 
teen hundred  years  immersion  was  the  prevailing 
practice  of  the  church  of  Christ.  The  names  of 
Calvin,  Luther,  Melanchthon,  Neander,  Wesley, 
Geikie,  Schaff,  Dean  Stanley,  Canon  Liddon,  and 
a  score  more,  can  be  given  as  authority  for  the 
statement  that  baptism  is  immersion,  and  that  this 


1 88    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

was  the  practice  of  the  apostoHc  church,  and  of 
the  churches  for  centuries  later.  Why  cannot  we 
all  go  back  to  this  primitive,  apostolic,  and  catholic 
ordinance  ?  Why  not  ?  Will  any  one  give  a  good 
reason  for  the  refusal  to  obey  Christ  and  the  apos- 
tles ?  Is  organic  union  desired  ?  Why  not,  then, 
begin  where  the  apostles  began  ?  But  most  of  all, 
let  us  preserve  the  spirit  of  love,  and  we  shall  have 
essential  union,  which  is  far  better  than  merely  a 
cold,  formal,  organic  union. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  it  is  said  that  when 
Ptolemy  built  the  Pharos  he  desired  to  make  his 
own  name  immortal,  but  the  architect  deemed  it 
unfair  that  the  king's  name  should  endure  while  his 
own  should  perish.  He,  therefore,  cut  the  king's 
name  in  plaster,  but  deep  in  the  imperishable  gran- 
ite he  carved  his  own  name — Sostratus.  The  waves 
dashing  against  the  Pharos  washed  off  the  plaster. 
The  king's  name  disappeared,  but  the  name  of 
Sostratus  was  seen  in  imperishable  letters.  The 
name  of  Presbyterian,  Congregationalist,  Metho- 
dist, or  Baptist,  however  much  we  love  it,  and  how- 
ever loyal  we  are  to  it  now,  is  one  day  to  give 
place  to  that  name  which  is  above  every  name. 
Not  our  name,  but  the  name  of  our  Lord  and 
Saviour,  our  Prophet,  Priest,  and  King,  will  abide, 
and  amid  the  light  of  earth  and  the  increasing 
glory  of  eternity,  one  name  shall  alone  be  read — 
Jesus  Christ. 


VIII 
GREATER  BAPTIST  EFFICIENCY^ 

WE  meet  to-day  in  circumstances  of  universal 
interest.  The  echoes  of  the  great  centen- 
nial celebration  are  still  sounding  in  our  ears,  and 
the  tender  memories  and  glowing  hopes  which  it 
suggested  are  still  thrilling  our  hearts.  We  have 
seen  America  honored  throughout  the  world ;  we 
have  seen  her  crowned  and  enthroned  as  queen  in 
the  Congress  of  Nations.  With  glad  hearts  we 
have  entered  the  second  century  of  our  constitu- 
tional history  as  a  nation  ;  and  we  soon  shall  pass 
as  a  part  of  Christendom  into  the  twentieth  century 
of  the  Christian  era.  Already  we  hear  the  bugle 
notes  of  faith  and  hope  announcing  its  approach. 
We  hail  with  gratitude  and  joy  its  advent ;  it  will 
be,  we  venture  to  prophesy,  a  century  of  simpler 
faith,  of  purer  character,  of  warmer  zeal,  and  of 
fuller  consecration  than  the  nineteenth,  now  going 
into  the  shadows  of  the  past. 

^  Delivered  in  Tremont  Temple,  Boston,  before  the  American 
Baptist  Home  Mission  Society,  May  19,  1889.  On  the  occasion 
of  these  anniversary  meetings,  the  announcement  of  Mr.  John  D. 
Rockefeller's  first  gift  to  the  University  of  Chicago  was  made. 
This  gift  made  this  now  great  university  possible  ;  and  it  stimu- 
lated others  to  give  to  Yale,  Harvard,  Princeton,  Columbia,  and 
other  colleges,  arousing  their  ambition  and  partly  enabling  them 
to  become  universities  in  the  true  meaning  of  the  term. 

189 


I90    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  world  is  not  growing  worse.  The  church 
was  never  so  intelhgent,  so  benevolent,  and  so  con- 
secrated as  at  this  hour.  Jesus  Christ  is  King ;  his 
pierced  hand  is  on  the  helm  of  the  church  as  he 
guides  her  through  the  storms  of  the  centuries. 
Already  the  crimson  and  gold  of  a  brighter  day- 
color  the  eastern  sky.  Under  Christ's  safe  leader- 
ship we  are  swinging  forward  into  the  certain  trials, 
but  also  into  the  more  certain  triumphs  of  this 
opening  century. 

We  meet  to-day  under  the  influence  of  Rhode 
Island  and  Roger  Williams,  the  true  apostle  of  true 
soul-liberty.  Amid  the  grand  figures  of  the  early 
days  of  our  national  life  and  liberty  let  this  one — 
in  some  respects  the  grandest  of  them  all — shine 
forth  in  symmetrical  proportion's  and  in  undimmed 
lustre.  With  all  their  acknowledged  virtues,  many 
of  the  founders  of  our  great  nation  had  no  concep- 
tion of  true  religious  liberty ;  they  fled  from  perse- 
cution to  be  guilty  of  persecution  ;  they  opposed 
intolerance  when  they  were  its  victims  ;  they  favored 
intolerance  when  they  could  be  the  oppressors  and 
Baptists  were  the  victims.  Amid  the  glories  of 
these  centennial  memories  let  the  wisdom,  the 
manliness,  the  bravery,  the  justness,  and  the  godli- 
ness of  Roger  Williams  be  fully  recognized.  In 
the  foremost  ranks  of  the  true  apostles  of  the 
highest  soul-liberty  were  these  brave  Baptists, 
"shouting  the  battle  cry  of  freedom  "  in  its  noblest 
sense. 

We  meet  in  the  State  of  Massachusetts,  so  rich 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  I9I 

in  memorials  of  the  heroic  struggles  and  sublime 
achievements  of  the  founders  of  the  Republic. 
With  no  capital  but  granite  rocks  and  icebergs  and 
faith  in  Almighty  God,  these  men  and  women  laid 
the  foundations  of  this  mighty  nation.  They  have 
left  their  impress  on  America  and  on  the  world ; 
and  with  all  their  faults,  their  names  will  be  held  in 
everlasting  remembrance. 

We  meet  also  in  the  noble  and  historic  city  of 
Boston.  Here  the  cradle  of  liberty  was  rocked  by 
loving  hands  inspired  to  their  task  by  praying  hearts. 
From  this  cradle  went  forth  heroes  and  heroines, 
saints  and  martyrs,  whose  names  to-day  are  the 
nation's  heritage  and  the  world's  inspiration.  This 
city  is  sacred  in  Baptist  history.  In  this  city  of 
Boston,  John  Clarke,  Obadiah  Holmes,  and  James 
Crandall  were  cast  into  prison  for  the  sin  of  worship- 
ing God,  preaching  the  gospel,  and  baptizing  be- 
lievers. Here  Clarke  stood  stripped  at  the  whipping 
post,  but  some  humane  person,  without  his  consent 
and  contrary  to  his  judgment,  redeemed  him  with 
money  from  his  bloody  tormentors.  Endicott  said 
to  him  "you  have  denied  infant  baptism  and  de- 
serve death."  Here  Holmes,  who  would  not  consent 
to  be  released,  saying  that  he  "durst  not  accept  of 
deliverance  in  such  a  way,"  was  whipped  with  thirty 
stripes,  September  6,  165 1.  Bancroft  affirms  that 
Holmes  was  whipped  "unmercifully";  and  Governor 
Jenks  says  "that  for  many  days,  if  not  some  weeks, 
he  could  take  no  rest  but  upon  his  knees  and  elbows, 
not  being  able  to  suffer  any  part  of  his  body  to 


192    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

touch  the  bed  whereon  he  lay."     The  blood  of  the 
martyrs  is  evermore  the  seed  of  the  church. 

What  do  we  see  in  Boston  to-day  ?  Our  Baptist 
brethren  are  in  the  front  rank  in  numbers  among 
all  the  denominations  in  this  city.  God  be  thanked 
for  his  marvelous  kindness  to  his  beloved  people  in 
this  strong  city !  We  meet  also  in  Tremont  Temple. 
Tender  associations  gather  about  the  name.  From 
this  place  no  uncertain  sound  has  ever  gone  out 
regarding  either  the  flag  of  our  country  or  the 
cross  of  our  Christ.  Here  patriotism  and  piety 
have  sweetly  blended  ;  here  liberty  and  loyalty  have 
been  married  ;  here  men  have  taught  that  whether 
a  man  was  black  or  white,  red  or  yellow,  rich  or 
poor, 

A  man' s  a  man  for  a'  that 

The  object  of  this  discourse  is  to  ask  and  to  seek 
to  answer  the  question :  How  can  we  increase  the 
efficiency,  how  develop  the  power  of  the  Baptist 
denomination  as  a  witness  for  truth,  as  a  force  for 
God  and  man  in  the  world  ? 

We  recognize  at  the  outset  how  great  our  growth 
has  been,  how  wonderful  our  power  now  is,  and 
how  vast  our  future  achievements  will  be.  When 
Washington  was  inaugurated  the  population  of  the 
thirteen  States  which  comprised  the  Union  was 
three  million  seven  hundred  and  fifty  thousand. 
At  that  time  the  whole  number  of  Baptists  was 
fifty  thousand  ;  of  this  number,  then,  as  now,  the 
larger  part  was  in  the  South.     To-day  the  number 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  1 93 

of  States  has  increased  to  forty-two,  and  the  popu- 
lation is  from  sixty  to  sixty-five  millions.  What  is 
the  record  regarding  our  churches  ?  The  whole 
number  is  thirty-two  thousand  nine  hundred  ;  of 
ministers  the  number  is  twenty-one  thousand  four 
hundred  and  twenty ;  and  of  church-members 
almost  three  millions.  A  century  ago  we  were  but 
one  in  seventy-five  ;  now  we  are  one  in  twenty-two 
of  the  population.^  Well  may  we  thank  God  and 
take  courage. 

We  love  the  Baptist  denomination.  We  gave 
her  the  fervor  of  youth  ;  we  give  her  now  the  riper 
knowledge  and  the  heartier  conviction  of  mature 
years.  She  is  radiant  in  her  queenly  beauty.  Never 
did  knight  of  heroic  days  show  more  of  chivalry 
toward  the  queen  of  his  heart,  than  do  the  knights 
of  the  Cross  among  us  toward  the  body  whose  name 
we  bear.  To  us  the  Baptist  denomination  is  beau- 
tiful. Her  martyr's  crown  becomes  her  lofty  brow ; 
her  prison-soiled,  flame-charred,  and  blood-stained 
robes  are  lustrous  and  glorious.  Her  past  is  tri- 
umphant ;  her  future  is  resplendent.  Here  and 
now,  as  she  is  loyal  to  her  Lord,  we  give  her  the 
love  and  loyalty  of  our  true  hearts. 

In  answering  the  question  proposed  in  this  dis- 
cussion it  would  be  easy  to  say  that  we  need  more 
of  the  presence  and  power  of  the  Holy  Spirit,  more 

^  At  the  present  date  (1897)  the  number  of  States  is  45,  and  the 
population  is  between  70  and  75,000,000.  Our  numbers  are 
(1896)  :  churches,  40,658  ;  ministers,  27,257  ;  membership, 
3,824,038  ;  about  I  in  every  19  of  the  population. 

N 


194    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

loyalty  to  Christ  and  to  his  truth,  more  piety  in 
heart  and  perseverance  in  work,  more  faith  in  God, 
and  more  faithfulness  in  duty.  All  these  things, 
and  many  more  of  the  same  kind  we  certainly 
need.  But  so  do  all  the  denominations  of  Chris- 
tians equally  with  us  ;  we  certainly  are  not  willing 
to  admit  that  they  surpass  us  in  any  of  these 
respects.  We  believe  that  we  have  stood  with  sin- 
gular loyalty  to  God's  word  all  through  the  cen- 
turies. This  discussion,  therefore,  rules  out  at  the 
outset  all  those  needs  of  ours  which  are  common 
to  all  the  other  bodies  of  Christians.  The  question 
is,  What  do  we  as  a  denomination,  with  our  dis- 
tinctive views  of  God's  word  and  our  unique  ob- 
servances of  the  ordinances  of  God's  house,  need 
to  our  greater  efficiency  in  the  world  ?  If  our  views 
are  worth  holding,  they  are  worth  propagating ;  if 
we  are  called  to  influence  one  man,  we  should 
strive  to  influence  all  men  ;  if  we  are  chosen  wit- 
nesses for  Christ,  as  I  believe  we  are,  of  truths 
either  denied  or  but  partially  taught  by  others,  we 
must  utter  our  testimony  in  Jerusalem,  in  Judea, 
in  Samaria,  and  even  unto  the  uttermost  parts  of 
the  earth. 

HIGHER    EDUCATIONAL    STANDARD. 

That  we  may  attain  greater  efficiency,  we  need 
a  higher  standard  of  education,  both  for  the  clergy 
and  the  laity. 

The  cry  for  an  educated  ministry  has  gone  out ; 
it  has  been  heard  to  a  considerable  degree.     No 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  1 95 

man  can  surpass  me  in  attaching  importance  to  the 
divine  element  in  the  call  and  preparation  of  men 
for  the  ministry.  Until  this  call  is  heard  no  man 
ought  to  enter  upon  the  sacred  duty.  No  human 
learning  can  be  a  substitute  for  the  tuition  of  the 
Holy  Ghost ;  no  college  can  ever  fit  men  for  this 
high  vocation  except  they  daily  study  in  the  school 
of  Christ,  which  evermore  must  be  the  noblest 
university.  But  God  uniformly  gives  special  train- 
ing to  the  men  and  women  for  whom  he  has  special 
work.  No  amount  of  piety  will  ever  sanctify  stu- 
pidity. We  have  an  exalted  appreciation  of  the 
work  of  many  of  our  fathers  and  brethren  who  did 
not  have  the  advantages  of  the  schools ;  but  it 
should  ever  be  borne  in  mind  that  their  success  was 
not  because  of,  but  in  spite  of,  these  disadvantages. 
Given  the  advantages,  with  their  unique  endow- 
ments, and  what  mighty  men  of  valor  they  would 
have  been  !  It  is  sometimes  said  that  men  like 
Mr.  Moody  are  mighty  without  the  learning  of  the 
schools  ;  but  Mr.  Moody  is  learned  along  his  spe- 
cial and  narrow  lines,  and  his  power  is  in  proportion 
to  his  learning.  I  say  often  to  young  men  :  "  If  you 
are  quite  sure  that  you  have  the  natural  gifts  of 
Spurgeon  or  Moody  or  Horace  Greeley,  then  go 
into  ministerial  and  editorial  work  as  did  they ;  but 
many  of  your  friends  doubt  whether  on  that  basis 
you  would  be  justified  in  neglecting  all  possible 
preparation." 

There  will  be  men  who,  from  their  years  and 
their  poverty,  cannot  take  a  full  course  of  ministerial 


196    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 


training  ;  in  their  case  a  shorter  course  is  justifiable. 
But  if  a  man  who  has  the  opportunity  to  take  the 
full  course,  and  who  from  laziness  or  a  low  estimate 
of  the  dignity  and  difficulty  of  the  Lord's  work  will 
not  take  it,  then  that  man  proves  that  he  is  not  a 
fit  candidate  for  the  ministry  of  Jesus  Christ.  The 
men  who  did  not  have  the  advantages  of  learning — 
in  the  technical  sense — and  who  have  nevertheless 
done  such  good  work,  were  men  who  would  have 
availed  themselves  of  these  advantages  if  that  had 
been  possible.  This  is  no  time  for  "shortcuts" 
into  the  ministry  ;  never  were  the  demands  more 
numerous  ;  never  was  full  preparation  more  neces- 
sary ;  never  w^ere  kindergarten  theological  semi- 
naries for  ministers  at  home  or  missionaries  abroad 
so  little  needed  as  now.  A  year  more  than  the 
fullest  course  in  each  case  were  better  than  an  hour 
less. 

The  cry  for  an  educated  ministry  has  been  so 
largely  heard  that  now  in  a  great  many  cases  we 
do  not  fear  the  result  of  a  comparison  in  this  re- 
spect with  the  ablest  men  of  any  of  the  various 
denominations.  But  still  there  is  room  for  improve- 
ment. Too  many  enter  the  ministry  who  have 
never  had  a  course  of  training  in  any  theological 
seminary ;  and  quite  too  many  are  in  our  theological 
seminaries  who  have  not  pursued  a  college  course, 
and  unfortunately  the  number  in  some  seminaries 
is  not  decreasing.  We  need  more  men  who  are 
scholars  in  the  exact  sense  of  that  term ;  men  who 
are  in  a  process  of  training  to  become  professors. 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  1 97 

commentators,  and  litterateurs.  We  have  too  few 
who  are  authors.  Thank  God,  the  number  of  au- 
thors is  increasing.  During  the  past  year  Baptists 
have  produced  volumes  on  theology  and  philosophy, 
and  Bible  commentaries  which  are  an  honor  to  the 
denomination,  to  the  country,  and  to  Christianity. 

We  need  greater  numbers  of  thoroughly  educa- 
ted laymen.  Our  membership  is  over  three  millions. 
This  represents  a  population  of  nine  to  ten  millions 
who  are  members  or  adherents  of  Baptist  churches. 
This  is  about  one-sixth  of  the  total  population. 
Are  we  furnishing  one-sixth  of  the  editors,  of  the 
lawyers,  of  the  doctors,  and  of  the  ministers  ?  Are 
we  furnishing  one-sixth  of  the  judges,  of  the  sena- 
tors, and  of  the  congressmen?  Are  we  furnishing 
one-sixth  of  the  teachers  in  public  schools  and 
colleges  ?  Are  we  sending  one-sixth  of  the  young 
ladies  in  schools  and  colleges  for  women  from  Bap- 
tist families?  We  owe  it  to  the  world  and  to 
Christ  to  furnish  this  proportion  ;  are  we  doing  it? 
Is  this  proportion  of  the  students  in  our  academies 
Baptists  or  from  Baptist  families  ?  We  cannot  too 
highly  commend  the  value  of  academic  instruction. 
Many  men  cannot  go  through  college.  But  such 
men  may  get  in  our  best  academies  a  scholarly  trend 
which  shall  influence  them  all  their  life.  Are  we 
furnishing  one-sixth  of  the  great  scholars  of  America  ? 
We  owe  it  to  ourselves  and  to  our  country  and  to  our 
Lord  to  give  this  proportion.  We  never  can  have 
great  scholars  unless  we  can  devise  some  wise  sys- 
tem of  graduate  instruction. 


198    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

In  connection  with  the  great  university  of 
which  some  of  us  dream,  this  may  be  possible. 
This  hope  is  in  advance  of  all  existing  institutions. 
Strictly  speaking,  there  is  not  to-day  a  university 
in  America.  Yale  is  not ;  Harvard  is  not ;  Prince- 
ton is  not ;  Johns  Hopkins  is  not,  though  it  comes 
nearer  to  the  realization  of  this  high  ideal  than  any 
other  American  institution  of  to-day.  There  are 
great  hopes  in  the  hearts  of  a  few  large-minded 
and  far-seeing  Baptists,  that  the  day  will  soon  dawn 
when  under  our  auspices  will  be  the  greatest  uni- 
versity on  the  American  continent.  Baptists  have 
a  splendid  opportunity;  they  may  be  the  leaders 
in  the  higher  education  of  this  vast  continent. 
Their  history  superbly  qualifies  them  for  such 
leadership.  To-day  the  door  of  opportunity  springs 
wide  open  to  their  leaders  as  they  are  marching 
forward  under  a  high  educational,  patriotic,  and 
religious  impulse.  It  is  earnestly  hoped  that  soon 
munificent  gifts  will  be  made  which  will  immor- 
talize their  donor  or  donors,  and  which  will  lay 
the  foundation  of  the  first  great  university  in  our 
country.  Baptists  ought  to  be  leaders  in  every 
great  educational  movement.  They  have  scholars 
capable  of  planning  and  manning  such  an  institu- 
tion. They  have  men  of  wealth  who  can  lay  its 
foundations  broad  and  deep,  and  who  will  give 
their  best  wisdom  to  the  erection  of  the  contem- 
plated and  superb  structure.  May  God  hasten  the 
day  for  the  realization  of  the  hopes  of  some  of  his 
noblest  and  most  consecrated  sons  and  daughters ! 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  1 99 

APPROPRIATE  RITUAL. 

We  need  a  more  stately,  ornate,  reverent,  and 
scriptural  form  of  public  worship.  The  devotional 
element  ought  to  be  more  fully  emphasized.  It  is 
easy  to  see  that  some  religious  bodies  which  hitherto 
have  had  elaborate  forms  of  public  service  are 
tending  toward  greater  simplicity.  It  is  equally 
easy  to  see  that  those  which  have  been  characterized 
by  extreme  simplicity  are  tending  toward  greater 
fullness  and  richness  in  their  services.  Both  ten- 
dencies are  full  of  hope ;  both  tendencies  ought  to 
have  full  liberty.  There  are  Baptist  churches  which 
are  so  ritualistic  as  to  prefer  their  old,  barren,  and, 
to  many,  unattractive  services.  These  churches 
are  ritualistic.  Ritualism  is  the  strict  observance 
of  prescribed  forms  in  religion.  The  forms  may 
be  traditional  in  origin ;  and  they  may  be  plain, 
barren,  and  even  uncouth  in  character.  The  rit- 
ualism is  in  the  strict  observance  of  the  prescribed 
form,  not  in  the  character  of  the  form  itself  No 
Roman  or  Anglican  church  is  more  rigid  in  its  form 
of  worship  than  are  certain  Baptist,  Presbyterian, 
and  other  churches. 

Other  Baptist  churches  have  the  right  to  resent 
this  attempted  lordship  over  their  freedom  in  wor- 
shiping God.  Who  has  a  right  to  add  to  our 
Confession  of  Faith  an  article  which  insists  on  the 
infallibility  and  inspiration  of  certain  Puritans  in  all 
matters  of  public  worship?  They  rigidly  excluded 
the    use  of  the    Lord's    Prayer   in  their  services. 


200    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

They  considered  the  chanting  or  the  responsive 
reading  of  the  Psalms  as  savoring  of  papacy  or 
some  other  form  of  apostasy.  We  are  surprised 
that  any  one  should  think  that  the  honoring  of 
God's  word  in  public  service  should  be  considered 
as  partaking  of  the  abominations  of  the  "Scarlet 
woman"!  If  anything  is  clear  from  the  word  of 
God  itself,  it  is  that  its  responsive  reading,  or  an- 
tiphonal  chanting,  was  the  manner  in  which  some 
of  its  inspired  writers  used  it  in  the  public  worship 
of  God.  We  who  desire  deeper  reverence  in  our 
services  are  quite  willing  that  those  who  so  prefer 
should  cling  to  their  barren  forms,  even  though  we 
may  regret  their  ritualistic  spirit.  But  we  object  to 
their  endeavors  to  restrict  the  liberty  of  those  who 
are  freer  than  they  from  ritualism,  those  who  desire 
to  give  variety,  warmth,  color,  and  scripturalness 
to  the  public  worship  of  God.  Why  should  these  be 
charged  with  being  innovators  and  "apists"  ?  Why 
should  their  efforts  after  a  fuller  participation  on 
the  part  of  all  the  people  in  the  public  worship, 
their  desire  for  greater  spirituality  and  scriptural- 
ness, be  sneered  at  as  dilettanteism? 

Vigor  of  invective  these  critics  mistake  for  strength 
of  argument ;  bitterness  of  criticism  they  mistake 
for  loyalty  to  truth.  They  conspicuously  illustrate 
the  very  sin  which  they  uncharitably  charge  upon 
others.  In  the  name  of  what  they  claim  to  be 
Baptistic  they  would  force  upon  us  what  is  neither 
Baptistic  nor  scriptural.  Is  it  Baptistic  to  make 
the  example  of  certain  Puritans  instead  of  the  New 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENXY  20I 

Testament  the  rule  of  our  faith  and  practice  ? 
What  right  have  these  men  to  place  tradition  be- 
fore Scripture  ?  In  the  authority  of  God's  word 
Baptists  believe  with  all  their  hearts  ;  but  to  the 
teaching  of  an  often  narrow  and  bigoted  tradition 
they  attach  no  importance  whatever.  To  the  law 
and  the  testimony — this  is  our  appeal.  The  real 
question  is,  what  do  the  Scriptures  enjoin,  forbid, 
or  permit  as  to  public  worship  ?  To  ask  any  other 
question,  to  attempt  to  decide  the  question  on  any 
other  basis,  is  unworthy  of  a  Baptist.  But  the 
moment  the  question  is  asked  these  self-constituted 
censors  of  their  brethren  are  condemned,  for  the 
New  Testament  is  nearly  silent  on  the  question, 
and  permits  the  largest  liberty  to  the  people  of 
God. 

In  the  little  that  it  does  say  it  is  at  variance  with 
the  censors.  Our  Lord  himself  says,  "After  this 
manner,  therefore,  pray  ye,"  but  the  censors  say, 
"After  this  manner,  therefore,  pray  ye  noty  And 
when  they  had  sung  a  hymn  (/.  e.,  chanted  a  psalm) 
they  went  out ;  but  the  censors  say  that  chanting 
a  psalm,  or  even  reading  it  antiphonally,  is  ritualism 
of  the  most  objectionable  type.  We  may  celebrate 
the  birth  of  Washington,  but  not  the  birth  of  our 
Lord  ;  we  may  observe  the  anniversary  of  our  coun- 
try's independence,  but  not  the  anniversary  of  our 
Lord's  resurrection  ;  we  may  decorate  with  flowers 
the  graves  of  our  nation's  dead,  but  not  the  house 
of  God  ;  we  may  fill  our  houses  with  rugs  from 
Daghestan,  and  pottery  from  Japan,  and  works  of 


202    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

art  and  bric-a-brac  from  the  four  quarters  of 
heaven,  until  they  are  ablaze  with  color  and  beauty, 
but  we  must  worship  God  in  barnlike  structures 
devoid  of  beauty,  and  in  a  ceremony  as  funereal 
and  austere  as  we  can  make  it. 

Does  anybody  believe  that  we  please  God  better 
by  making  his  house  and  his  worship  repellent  than 
by  making  both  cheerful  and  attractive?  We  re- 
pudiate this  censorship.  We  assert  our  liberty ; 
we  despise  this  traditionalism  and  ritualism.  The 
man  who  insists  on  these  forms  handed  down  to  us 
from  Puritanic  times  is  under  the  bondage  of  a  piti- 
ful formalism.  A  Baptist  church  should  refuse  to 
enter  into  or  to  accept  such  bondage  even  for  an 
hour.  Shall  we,  as  severely  orthodox  Baptists  once 
did,  eschew  singing  of  any  kind  ?  Shall  we,  as 
some  Presbyterians  still  do,  vehemently  protest 
against  organs  as  inventions  of  the  devil  ?  Are  our 
children  ritualists  and  "  apists "  when  in  Sunday- 
schools  they  read  the  Bible  responsively  and  recite 
in  concert  the  Lord's  Prayer?  Where  would  these 
censors  have  us  stop  ?  Some  of  us  will  continue 
to  take  the  example  of  David,  of  prophets,  of 
apostles,  and  of  the  Lord  himself,  rather  than  the 
traditions  of  the  Puritans,  as  our  authority  in  public 
worship. 

The  best  of  everything  belongs  to  God.  He  is 
a  God  of  beauty  "  in  earth  and  sky  and  sea."  The 
flowers  are  his  beautiful  thoughts  ;  the  mountains 
are  his  majestic  thoughts  ;  and  the  stars  are  his 
brilliant  thoughts.     The  temple  of  old  was  not  too 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  203 


splendid  to  be  his  dwelling-place.  And  as  God 
claims  the  best  of  everything  in  his  worship,  so 
Baptists  have  a  right  to  the  best  of  everything  in 
rendering  him  that  worship.  It  has  been  said  that 
the  chief  difference  between  Roman  Catholics  and 
Protestant  Episcopalians  is  that  the  former  are 
"papists"  and  the  latter  are  "apists."  I  neither 
accept  nor  contradict  the  remark,  I  simply  quote 
it ;  but  I  know  that  Baptists  are  neither  the  one 
nor  the  other.  We  are  older  than  either.  We 
talk  not  so  much  of  the  early  church  as  of  the 
earliest  church  ;  we  go  back  to  the  First  Baptist 
Church  in  Jerusalem.  All  that  is  grand  in  the 
songs  of  Christendom  is  ours  ;  all  that  is  penitential 
in  the  historic  Confessions,  and  all  that  is  binding 
in  the  noblest  professions  is  ours.  We  repudiate 
the  idea  that  any  body  of  Christians — and  certainly 
one  of  the  smallest  and  most  sectarian  of  the  sects 
— has  a  monopoly  of  the  historic  creeds  and  Con- 
fessions. The  sublime  Gloria  Patri,  the  lofty  Glo- 
ria in  Excelsis,  the  grand  Te  Dciim — these  are  ours. 
We  have  a  noble  share  in  the  glorious  heritage  of 
the  Christian  centuries.  Some  of  the  grandest 
hymns  are  ours  in  the  fullest  sense  ;  and  all  the 
noblest  songs  of  Christendom  are  ours  to  use  and  to 
enjoy.  Let  us  claim  our  own  ;  let  us  take  it  wher- 
ever we  find  it. 

We  repudiate  the  idea  that  Baptistic  is  in  any 
sense  synonymous  with  "  booristic  " — if  I  may  coin 
a  word.  We  must  sadly  confess  that  occasionally 
there  seems    to   be  such   a  suggestion  ;    and    the 


204    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

saddest  part  of  it  is  that  there  are  otherwise  intel- 
ligent Baptists  who  seem  to  admit  and  even  to  ac- 
cept such  a  relationship.  Are  we  willing  to  admit 
that  it  is  more  Baptistic  in  country  places  to  gossip 
on  Sunday  around  the  horse-shed  or  block  than  to 
come  reverently  at  once  into  the  house  of  God  ? 
Are  we  willing  to  admit  that  it  is  more  Baptistic  to 
gaze  about  the  house  of  God  on  entering  than  to 
spend  a  few  moments  in  silent  prayer,  either  kneel- 
ing or  with  bowed  head  ?  Are  we  willing  to  admit 
that  irreverence  in  manner  is  more  Baptistic  than 
reverence  ?  If  so,  then  the  time  to  repudiate  what 
is  Baptistic  has  come  ;  but  we  insist  that  all  these 
nobler  qualities  are  inseparable  from  what  is  truly 
Baptistic.  If  these  self-constituted  censors  want 
boorishness,  unfortunately  it  is  not  wanting.  There 
are  men  among  whom  and  places  in  which  it  is 
common  enough  ;  but  we  emphatically  deny  that 
it  is  either  Baptistic  or  scriptural. 

In  this  connection  we  may  be  permitted  to  say 
that  greater  care  in  the  administration  of  the  ordi- 
nance of  baptism  ought  to  be  taken.  This  ordi- 
nance is  beautiful  in  itself;  it  is  also  profoundly 
significant  in  its  religious  symbolism,  and  it  ought 
to  be  made  as  beautiful  as  possible  in  its  admin- 
istration. Often,  unfortunately,  it  is  administered 
so  as  to  be  unimpressive  and  occasionally  distaste- 
ful. This  ordinance  was  honored  at  our  Lord's 
baptism  by  the  audible  or  visible  presence  of  each 
Person  of  the  blessed  Trinity  :  God  the  Father  by 
an    audible  voice  from  heaven,   God    the    Son  in 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  205 

human  form  coming  up  out  of  the  Jordan,  and  God 
the  Spirit  in  the  form  of  a  dove.  Who  dares  dis- 
honor what  God  hath  so  honored  ?  We  dishonor 
the  ordinance  sometimes  by  making  it  the  subject 
of  frivolous  remark,  and  oftener  by  its  unimpressive 
observance.  Do  not  call  the  effort  to  make  it 
beautiful  and  reverent  unworthy  of  our  thought. 
Let  the  construction  of  the  baptisteiy  and  all  the 
accessories  of  the  ordinance  be  tasteful,  beautiful, 
and  reverent.  All  that  flowers,  music,  and  rever- 
ent propriety  can  do  in  this  respect  ought  to  be 
done.  Were  the  ordinance  not  divine  in  its  origin 
and  beautiful  in  its  symbolism  our  frequent  careless 
administration  of  it  might  have  led  to  its  general 
neglect.  Other  denominations  are  often  forced  to 
observe  it,  for  the  people  will  not  be  satisfied  with 
human  substitutes  for  this  divinely  appointed  and 
inherently  beautiful  ordinance.  Let  us  honor  its 
divine  appointment  by  its  reverent  observance. 

In  line  with  these  remarks  is  the  importance  of 
building  beautiful  houses  of  worship.  Our  beloved 
Home  Mission  Society  has  done  much  toward  ele- 
vating and  gratifying  the  taste  of  the  people  in  this 
regard.  Thank  God,  the  day  has  gone  by  when 
one  is  almost  sure  that  the  worst-looking  and  most 
ill-located  church  in  a  town  is  a  Baptist  church. 
In  many  towns  the  reverse  is  now  true,  thanks  to 
the  plans  sent  out  by  this  society,  and  to  other 
similar  influences.  We  bid  farewell  without  a  tear 
to  the  old  drygoods  box  meeting-house.  The  best 
church  in  every  town  should  be  the  Baptist  church. 


206    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

God  is  the  friend  of  beauty.  There  is  no  piety  in 
ughness.  Without  extra  cost  we  may  have  houses 
which  shall  be  models  of  architectural  beauty  and 
of  church  propriety.  In  the  name  of  all  that  is 
beautiful,  tasteful,  aesthetic,  and  worshipful,  let  us 
have  a  general,  radical,  and  universal  reform  in  the 
old  styles  of  Baptist  ecclesiastical  architecture. 
Indeed,  this  reform  has  already  commenced.  We 
give  it  glad  welcome.  Every  church  is  the  incar- 
nation of  the  religious  thought  of  those  who  worship 
within  its  walls.  Let  our  thought  be  simple,  scrip- 
tural, divine  ;  and  then  let  the  structure  in  its  ap- 
propriate architecture  embody  that  thought  to  the 
glory  of  God  and  the  advancement  of  his  truth. 

FULLER    CO-OPERATION, 

We  need  a  greater  degree  of  co-operation  among 
Baptist  churches  in  towns,  cities.  States,  everywhere. 
We  have  often  allowed  independency  to  carry  us 
to  foolish  extremes.  We  have  been  so  fearful 
of  compromising  our  independency  that  we  have 
often  compromised  our  common  sense  ;  indeed, 
we  have  at  times  entirely  dispensed  with  it.  Not 
independence  so  much  as  interdependence  is  the 
need  of  our  churches.  We  have  the  men  now  as 
part  of  our  denominational  force  who  could  partly 
secure  this  co-operation.  The  secretaries  of  our 
State  conventions,  working  with  the  district  secre- 
taries, the  missionary  committees  and  the  executive 
committees,  could  largely  do  this  work.  These 
secretaries  ougrht  to  be  familiar  with  the  conditions 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  20/ 

of  every  part  of  the  field  under  their  direction. 
They  might  be  in  effect  bishops  in  the  modern 
though  unscriptural  sense  of  that  word.  We  ought 
to  exalt  their  office.  They  might  do  much  toward 
getting  churches  for  churchless  pastors  and  pastors 
for  pastorless  churches ;  they  might  do  much 
toward  reconciling  differences  in  churches  ;  they 
might  do  much  toward  giving  hope  to  despondent 
churches  and  in  getting  other  fields  of  labor  for 
men  not  competent  to  do  the  work  in  the  field 
where  they  are  located. 

The  district  secretaries  and  the  missionaries  of 
the  Home  Mission  Society  could  do  similar  work 
in  certain  fields.  We  have  not  used  as  we  might 
the  forces  at  our  command.  It  is  pitiful  that  we 
have  allowed  so  much  power  to  be  latent  or  to  be 
operative  only  to  hurt  rather  than  to  help.  Here  is 
a  church  in  a  large  and  growing  town.  For  years  it 
has  been  engaged  in  civil  strife  ;  its  members  are 
tearing  it  to  pieces.  The  work  of  years  is  going  to 
decay ;  some  members  go  to  no  church  ;  others 
are  drifting  into  churches  of  other  denominations. 
One's  heart  aches  to  see  how  we  lose  ground  in 
certain  important  fields.  Our  polity  has  in  it  ele- 
ments of  the  greatest  strength  ;  it  has  been  recently 
tested,  and  it  has  triumphed  where  it  has  had  a  fair 
opportunity,  while  churches  with  "  long  and  strong 
creeds"  and  with  highly  organized  machinery  have 
been  shaken  to  their  foundations.  But  in  order 
that  our  simple  organization  may  be  strong  our 
people  must  be  spiritual  ;  so  long  as  we  are  loyal 


208    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

to  Christ  and  his  word  we  are  loyal  to  all  church 
obligations.  When  the  higher  loyalty  ceases  the 
lower  loyalty  becomes  an  impossibility.  When 
we  draw  near  to  Christ  we  approach  one  another 
in  loving  fellowship  and  in  loyal  service. 

We  believe  that  our  simple  Baptist  polity  can 
adapt  itself  to  the  ever-changing  conditions  of  our 
advancing  civilization.  It  has  in  it  the  fresh,  vig- 
orous, and  variant  elements  of  the  word  of  God  in 
its  adaptation  to  the  multiplying  needs  of  our 
modern  times.  Creeds  made  by  men  can  be 
changed  by  men.  We  are  capable  of  doing  our 
thinking  to-day  as  were  ever  churchmen  of  an 
earlier  day.  We  are  not  anchored  to  the  ceme- 
teries of  past  generations,  but  we  must  ever  keep 
near  to  the  command  and  the  person  of  our  Lord 
Jesus  as  King  in  Zion.  There  really  is  but  one 
Baptist  church  in  any  given  town  or  community. 
That  church  may  for  the  convenience  of  its  mem- 
bers meet  in  different  places  and  under  several 
names,  but  all  its  interests  are  harmonious  ;  no  one 
organization  desires  to  be  built  up  at  the  expense 
of  other  organizations  ;  the  interests  of  each  are 
the  interests  of  all.  There  is  no  contradiction 
between  the  idea  of  true  independency  and  this 
noble  spirit  of  interdependency.  When  this  large, 
this  fraternal,  this  Christian  spirit  dominates  each 
Baptist  church  then  our  churches  as  a  whole  will 
be  clear  as  the  sun,  fair  as  the  moon,  and  ter- 
rible in  their  opposition  to  evil  as  an  army  with 
banners. 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  209 

GREATER    COMPREHENSIVENESS. 

We  need  greater  comprehensiveness  in  our  faith 
in  relation  to  members  of  our  churches  and  in  the 
relation  of  churches  to  each  other.  I  am  not  ready 
to  believe  that  this  is  a  peculiarly  skeptical  age.  It 
certainly  is  not  in  the  coarse  sense  in  which  unbelief 
was  understood  in  the  time  of  Paine  and  Voltaire. 
We  are  always  disposed  to  depreciate  the  present. 
But  as  we  look  to  the  twentieth  century,  we  become 
radiant  with  hope  ;  the  pendulum  is  swinging  back. 
Many  men  who  have  no  faith  in  God  and  religion 
wish  their  children  to  be  trained  in  godliness. 
Many  conservative  business  men  see  the  dangers  to 
which  atheism,  socialism,  and  kindred  "  isms  "  lead. 
But  it  is  a  time  of  inquiry,  of  questioning — perhaps 
of  doubting.  If  only  the  doubt  be  honest  we  need 
not  fear  the  result.  Christianity  challenges  investi- 
gation. Each  church  must  decide  in  each  case 
according  to  the  spirit  and  character  of  the  man 
what  course  had  better  be  pursued.  Let  the  mantle 
of  our  church  and  denominational  life  be  large 
enough  to  include  those  who  differ  from  us  at  some 
points,  if  their  spirit  be  Christlike  and  their  ministry 
be  fraternal. 

Here  is  a  man  who  has  adopted  certain  views 
which  are  said  to  be  those  of  the  so-called  new 
school  of  theology.  He  is,  therefore,  open  to  fair 
criticism.  But  certain  questions  ought  to  be  asked. 
Who  is  the  brother?  What  is  his  spirit?  What 
are  the  characteristics  of  his  ministry  ?     These  and 


210    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

similar  questions  ought  to  be  asked  in  deciding  on 
our  course  of  treatment.  May  he  not  have  a  mis- 
sion ?  Perhaps  he  can  reach  men  whom  you  and 
I  could  not  touch.  Perhaps  he  can  save  to  Christ 
and  to  the  denomination  men  and  women  who 
otherwise  might  drift  from  both. 

Here  is  a  man  who  has  views  on  faith  healing  or 
the  second  coming  of  Christ  which  many  think  un- 
scriptural.  Let  him  hold  them.  We  need  to  be 
represented  in  such  circles.  Such  a  man  may 
gather  about  him  those  who  otherwise  would  have 
no  Baptist  home.  Our  policy  should  be  inclusive 
rather  than  exclusive.  We  already  have  lost  too 
many  good  men  who  might  still  be  with  us  had 
they  been  treated  with  greater  consideration.  Loy- 
alty to  Christ  does  not  require  us  to  be  unbrotherly 
toward  brethren.  Our  denomination  is  large 
enough,  strong  enough,  and  free  enough  to  include 
men  who  differ  from  the  majority  on  comparatively 
unimportant  side  issues.  We  ought  to  have,  and 
we  must  have,  room  within  our  ranks  for  men  like 
noble  brethren  who  could  readily  be  named  and 
who  represent  phases  of  Christian  doctrine  not  held 
by  our  brethren  generally.  So  far  as  they  are 
loyal  to  Christ,  useful  in  his  service,  and  fraternal  in 
their  relations  with  their  brethren,  they  can  have, 
and  they  shall  have,  a  warm  welcome  in  our  ranks. 
The  narrow  and  exclusive  policy  ought  to  be  sharply 
rebuked  so  often  as  its  unwholesome  spirit  is  mani- 
fested among  us. 

Here  is  a  man  whose  views  on  communion  are 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  2  I  I 

somewhat  lax.  Men  will  differ  among  us  on  the 
communion  and  other  questions  of  church  order. 
We  have  ever  been  the  honest,  consistent,  enthu- 
siastic advocates  of  soul-liberty.  For  the  assertion 
of  this  right  we  have  suffered  persecution  even  unto 
death  in  many  lands.  We  must  continue  to  mani- 
fest this  spirit  as  truly  toward  brethren  bearing  the 
Baptist  name  as  toward  those  outside  of  our  ranks. 
The  spirit  of  charity  must  have  its  constant  illustra- 
tion and  its  due  recognition  in  every  rank  both  of 
the  clergy  and  of  the  laity, 

PARTICIPATION    IN    GENERAL   WORK. 

A  larger  participation  in  non-denominational  re- 
ligious work  and  in  general  benevolence  is  an  ele- 
ment in  greater  Baptist  efficiency.  We  have  often 
been  too  exclusive  in  our  lines  of  work.  We  have 
sometimes  said  that  we  could  not  have  a  full 
recognition  in  non-denominational  organizations. 
This  has  not  been  my  experience.  If  we  fail  of 
recognition  the  fault  is  our  own.  Let  us  take  our 
place  and  do  our  share  of  the  work  and  the  proper 
recognition  will  certainly  come.  We  have  too  often 
waited  to  be  recognized  ;  let  us  quietly  take  our 
position  and  give  others  their  desei"ved  recognition. 
We  need  not  be  afraid  of  our  distinctive  views  ; 
they  will  often  be  best  defended  by  our  consistent 
and  consecrated  lives.  The  denomination  that 
does  the  work  will  get  the  people.  Our  views  may 
be  stamped  with  the  divine  authority,  but  if  they 
are  not  incarnated  in  great-hearted,  Christ-loving, 


212    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and  soul-seeking  men  and  women  they  will  make 
but  little  headway  in  the  world.  Religion  is  now 
intensely  practical.  Not  the  orthodoxy  of  the 
creed,  but  the  activity  of  the  life  is  the  element  by 
which  our  Christianity  is  oftenest  judged.  Not  the 
depth  of  our  well,  but  the  number  of  thirsty  people 
whom  we  refresh — this  is,  after  all,  the  practical 
test.  We  must  be  able  to  say  of  our  denomina- 
tional life,  as  Christ  said  of  himself  and  his  religion, 
"come  and  see."  Christianity  will  bear  the  test  ; 
our  denominationalism  must  do  the  same.  If  it 
cannot,  it  will  fail,  and  it  ought  to  fail. 

We  have  done  but  little  along  these  directly 
practical  and  humanitarian  lines  of  Christian  service. 
I  know  well  that  the  gospel  we  preach  reaches  to 
the  heart  and  life,  and  that  Christ  did  not  perform 
many  miracles  in  feeding  the  hungry  or  in  healing 
the  sick.  We  are  to  preach  Christ  and  him  cruci- 
fied, but  we  must  not  forget  that  this  is  the  broadest 
preaching  conceivable  ;  it  touches  every  interest  of 
humanity.  It  has  its  relations  to  business,  and  to 
social  and  to  political  life  as  truly  as  to  the  distinc- 
tively religious  life.  We  were  at  the  first  especially 
an  evangelistic  people.  We  had  to  be  also  to  no 
small  degree  a  militant  people  ;  we  had  to  fight  our 
way ;  we  had  to  establish  our  right  to  be.  These 
results  we  have  now  assuredly  achieved.  We  shall 
not  be  a  less  evangelistic  people  than  in  former 
times  ;  but,  still  retaining  the  spirit  of  true  evangel- 
ical fervor,  we  shall  move  on  to  all  forms  of  whole- 
some educational  and  humanitarian  work. 


GREATER    BAPTIST    EFFICIENCY  213 

Rapid  strides  we  shall  soon  make,  without  doubt, 
in  educational  work.  Great  as  have  been  our  at- 
tainments in  this  respect  in  the  past,  they  will  be 
vastly  greater  in  the  near  future.  It  is  to  be  hoped 
that  we  shall  stand  in  the  very  front  rank  among 
the  educational  leaders  of  our  glorious  republic. 
But  we  must  also  move  on  to  the  founding  of  hos- 
pitals, sanitariums,  orphanages,  and  similar  forms 
of  humanitarian  service.  We  have  erred  greatly 
in  not  having  done  this  work  so  vigorously  as  we 
might  in  our  earlier  and  later  history.  God  is 
loudly  calling  to  us  to  take  our  place  among  the 
foremost  workers  in  these  practical  directions.  God 
has  great  duties  for  us  to  perform,  great  characters 
for  us  to  possess,  and  great  honors  for  us  to  wear. 
May  we  be  worthy  of  our  heroic,  martyred,  and 
sainted  sires,  worthy  of  our  sublime  opportunities, 
worthy  of  our  high  calling,  and  worthy  of  our  divine 
Lord  and  Saviour,  Jesus  Christ ! 


IX 

PRESSING  NEEDS  OF  FOREIGN  FIELDS^ 

IT  is  with  diffidence  that  I  rise  to  speak  on  any 
phase  of  foreign  missions.  My  recent  and 
hurried  trip  gave  me  an  opportunity  of  studying 
mission  work  only  in  the  Hawaiian  Islands  and  in 
Japan.  In  the  former  country  I  saw  the  good  fruit- 
age of  the  labors  of  our  Congregational  churches, 
and  in  Japan  I  had  the  honor  of  meeting  represent- 
atives of  many  churches,  and  especially  our  prom- 
inent Baptist  workers.  On  three  occasions  I  ad- 
dressed goodly  numbers  of  missionaries  from  dif- 
ferent parts  of  Japan,  from  Corea,  Formosa,  China, 
and  other  heathen  countries,  but  I  did  not  have  the 
opportunity  of  visiting  Burma,  or  Southern  India. 
A  visit  to  these  two  fields  of  missionary  labor  I 
hope  to  make  in  the  course  of  a  few  years.  I  had 
opportunities  of  meeting  many  of  the  friends  and 
some  of  the  critics  of  foreign  mission  work,  and  I 
learned  to  appreciate  the  services  which  our  mis- 
sionaries have  rendered  and  the  difficulties  they 
now  encounter,  as  never  before.  Some  of  the  needs 
in  foreign  fields  I  may  be  permitted  to  name  and 
to  emphasize. 

^  Delivered   before  the  American   Baptist    Missionary  Union, 
Asbury  Park,  May  22,  1896. 
214 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         21 5 
THE    GOSPEL   THE    ONLY    REMEDY. 

We  need,  in  the  first  place,  a  profound,  steadfast, 
and  irresistible  conviction  that  nothing  but  the 
gospel  of  Jesus  Christ  can  save  the  heathen.  This 
statement  I  believe  to  be  true,  whether  we  have  in 
mind  temporal  or  eternal  salvation  ;  only  the  gospel 
can  save  the  heathen  to  personal  and  family  purity, 
to  civic  righteousness,  and  to  true  holiness.  It  is 
useless  to  deny  that  many  persons  are  now  doubt- 
ing the  truthfulness  of  this  statement.  Doubt 
touching  this  point  cuts  all  the  sinews  of  missionary 
effort  and  greatly  depletes  missionary  treasuries. 
If  we  inquire  carefully  as  to  the  causes  for  decreased 
contributions  we  shall  find  them  partly  in  the  subtle 
skepticism  of  the  time  regarding  the  necessity  of 
the  gospel  to  the  salvation  of  the  heathen  world. 
The  recent  visit  of  certain  heathen  men  to  the  Par- 
liament of  Religions  in  Chicago,  has  done  some- 
thing to  create  and  disseminate  this  skepticism. 
The  faith  of  some  has  been  shaken  and  the  doubts 
of  others  have  been  multiplied.  We  have  forgotten 
that  whatever  is  noble  in  these  gentlemen  is  largely 
the  product  of  Christianity.  They  would  never 
have  heard  of  Chicago  but  for  Christian  teaching. 
They  would  never  have  had  a  desire  to  visit  this  coun- 
try but  for  the  enlarging  and  ennobling  influences  of 
Christian  education.  How  came  they  to  burst  the 
bonds  of  caste  which  would  have  restricted  them  to 
their  own  land  ?  The  strong  but  gentle  hand  of 
Christianity  broke  these  bonds  which  for  centuries 


2l6    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

have  held  Hindus  and  other  heathen  reHgionists 
within  the  land  of  their  birth.  But  for  Christianity 
they  would  not  have  had  the  facilities  to  travel  from 
their  own  countiy  to  America  ;  but  for  Christianity 
there  would  have  been  no  exposition  at  Chicago  ; 
but  for  Christianity  these  men  would  not  have  had 
the  culture  which  made  their  addresses  and  pres- 
ence desirable  and  attractive  ;  but  for  Christianity 
they  would  not  have  possessed  the  high  ideals 
which  they  exhibited  to  the  assembled  multitudes 
who  listened  to  their  words.  Strictly  speaking 
these  men  were  not  the  product  of  heathenism 
pure  and  simple  ;  they  were  rather  the  product  of 
heathenism  somewhat  inspired  and  exalted  by 
Christian  instruction  and  ideals.  In  opposing  Chris- 
tianity these  men  were  like  those  who  climb  up  a 
ladder  into  a  tree,  and  when  seated  on  a  branch 
and  partaking  of  the  luscious  fruit,  kick  away  the 
ladder  and  deny  its  value.  In  opposing  Christianity 
they  are  like  men  seated  on  the  branch  of  a  tree  who 
saw  off  the  branch  between  themselves  and  the 
tree.  The  fact  is  that  the  local,  ethnic,  and  merely 
ethical  religions  cannot  really  exalt  men  socially, 
intellectually,  and  spiritually.  These  religions  have 
been  tested  for  thousands  of  years  and  are  to  be 
heartily  rejected  because  of  their  failure  to  bear  de- 
sirable fruit. 

Christianity  is  the  only  universal  religion  the 
world  has  ever  known.  When  on  the  mountain's 
side  in  Galilee  our  Lord  gave  his  Great  Commission 
he  uttered   the  newest  and    sublimest   truth    ever 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         21/ 

heard  by  human  ears.  FamiHarity  with  this  majes- 
tic command  has  blunted  the  edge  of  our  wonder  ; 
but  if  we  transport  ourselves  to  that  time  and  place 
and  listen  to  these  words  for  the  first  time,  we 
shall  see  that  they  are  as  comprehensive  as  they 
are  novel,  and  as  sublime  as  they  are  divine.  Our 
Lord  was  apparently  a  Galilean  peasant,  without 
the  courtiers  of  a  king  or  the  soldiers  of  a  ruler, 
and  yet  he  was  sending  his  few  followers  forth  to 
accomplish  the  greatest  task  that  had  ever  been 
assigned  to  mortal  man.  They  were  to  carry  the 
glad  tidings  of  salvation  in  his  name  to  every  crea- 
ture under  heaven.  Such  a  conception  never  en- 
tered the  mind  of  the  philosophers  of  Greece  or 
Rome  ;  nor  did  it  ever  occur  to  the  imagination  of 
the  dreamy  thinkers  of  the  Orient.  Their  religion 
was  for  a  particular  people  in  a  particular  country  ; 
their  faiths  were  local,  or  at  most  ethnic.  Their 
gods  were  the  gods  of  the  grove,  of  the  river,  of 
the  fountain,  or  of  some  other  limited  territory. 

Dr.  Hanna  has  pointed  out  that  among  the  Jews 
there  were  vague  conceptions  of  a  religion  for  the 
world  as  well  as  for  Judaism  ;  but  in  the  days  of  Christ, 
although  the  sacred  books  of  the  Jews  gave  these 
prophetic  hints,  the  people  had  become  the  nar- 
rowest and  most  bigoted  of  the  peoples  of  the  earth. 
They  gloried  in  their  exclusiveness  ;  their  faith  and 
their  patriotism  were  alike  for  their  own  people. 
Yet  among  this  exclusive  and  bigoted  race  arose 
One  who  gave  the  world  the  conception  of  a  univer- 
sal faith.     The  son  of  a  Galilean  tradesman  is  thus 


2l8    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

placed  in  the  front  rank  of  the  rehgionists  of  the 
world.  He  broached  and  projected  so  original,  so 
sublime,  and  so  unique  a  conception  that  I  to-day 
put  upon  his  brow  the  crown  of  honor  as  the  fore- 
most thinker  the  world  has  ever  produced.  Had 
Christ  done  nothing  more  than  give  the  world  the 
conception  of  a  universal  faith  and  worship,  he 
would  by  that  one  contribution  have  deserved  the 
first  place  among  the  thinkers  and  benefactors  of 
the  world. 

The  criticisms  of  certain  incompetent  critics  have 
also  tended  to  destroy  faith  in  the  necessity  of  the 
gospel  to  the  salvation  of  the  heathen.  Large  num- 
bers of  Europeans  who  visit  Oriental  countries 
have  no  faith  whatever  either  in  the  desirability  or 
possibility  of  saving  the  heathen.  I  was  frequently 
asked  by  European  traders  whether  I  believed 
there  ever  was  a  genuine  Asiatic  Christian  convert. 
The  average  European  regards  himself  as  belonging 
to  a  superior  race,  and  he  considers  the  Asiatic  to 
be  so  greatly  inferior  to  himself  as  to  be  fit  only  to 
be  a  hewer  of  wood  and  a  drawer  of  water.  He 
regards  the  Asiatic  as  in  his  proper  place  when  he 
is  serving  his  European  master.  The  coolies  and 
others  who  do  the  work  for  shipmasters  and  other 
European  traders  are  regarded  as  little  above  cattle. 
Heathenism  has  cheapened  humanity.  Heathen- 
ism has  robbed  its  votaries  of  the  dignity  and  glory 
inherent  in  men  and  women  made  in  the  image  of 
God.  Revealed  religion  exalts  men  into  the  like- 
ness of  their  Creator.      It  lifted  Moses  from  being 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         219 

the  child  of  a  slave  to  the  honors  of  the  royal  house 
of  Egypt.  It  lifted  David  from  the  position  of  a 
shepherd  to  the  throne  of  Israel.  It  took  Elisha 
from  the  plow  and  made  him  a  prophet  of  God. 
It  exalted  Gideon  to  be  the  conqueror  of  the  Mid- 
ianites  and  the  deliverer  of  Israel.  It  took  Luther 
from  the  rank  of  a  miner  and  made  him  a  king 
among  men.  It  exalted  Carey  from  the  shoe- 
maker's bench  to  a  place  among  scholars  and 
princes.  It  lifted  Lincoln  from  splitting  rails  to  the 
presidential  chair,  a  seat  as  lofty  as  any  throne 
among  the  nations. 

But  heathenism  separates  men  into  castes  and 
makes  the  lower  the  servant  and  slave  of  the  higher. 
Even  our  missionaries  must  guard  against  the  subtle 
temptation  to  regard  the  heathen  peoples  as  be- 
longing to  utterly  inferior  races. .  Heathenism  holds 
human  life  at  almost  no  value  ;  it  makes  it  little 
better  than  the  life  of  a  serpent,  a  mouse,  or  a  bat. 
Even  some  Europeans  regard  heathen  men  simply  as 
beasts  of  burden  and  women  as  their  toy  or  slave 
ministering  only  to  their  ignoble  desires.  Many 
Europeans  who  visit  heathen  lands  see  almost  noth- 
ing of  missionary  labors  and  successes.  They  see 
only  the  worst  side  of  the  lowest  heathenism  in  sea- 
port towns  ;  and,  it  must  be  admitted,  that  the 
heathen  in  those  towns  often  see  only  the  worst 
side  of  their  European  visitors.  These  critics  are 
utterly  incompetent  to  speak  with  authority.  They 
make  their  ignorance  the  ground  of  their  affirma- 
tions   against    Christian    work    in    heathen    lands. 


220    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Often,  it  is  sorrowfully  stated,  their  own  lives  are  so 
immoral  that  the  presence  of  missionaries  is  a  con- 
stant rebuke,  and  the  teaching  of  the  missionaries 
excites  their  sharpest  opposition.  One  blushes  for 
some  of  his  European  brethren  whom  he  sees  in 
Asiatic  cities.  They  often  live  without  any  restraint 
and  they  bring  reproach  upon  both  Europeanism 
and  Christianity.  It  is  impossible  to  speak  with 
the  exactness  of  detail  which  the  facts  warrant, 
when  matters  of  this  kind  are  under  discussion. 

Many  of  our  dilettante  travelers  take  their  cue 
from  European  military  and  naval  officers  and  from 
European  residents  and  so  pronounce  against  mis- 
sionary work  in  heathen  lands.  Their  judgment  is 
absolutely  worthless  ;  many  of  these  travelers  have 
not  visited  a  mission  and  have  not  met  a  missionary. 
The  more  ignorant  they  are  of  both  the  more  learn- 
edly do  they  talk  against  both.  Men  are  apt  to 
see  in  any  country  what  they  desire  to  see.  Many 
men  visit  Ceylon  and  never  see,  far  less  shoot,  an 
elephant ;  they  were  not  there  to  hunt  elephants. 
Many  other  men  visit  the  country  and  never  see  a 
missionary ;  they  were  not  there  to  visit  missions 
and  missionaries.  The  fact  is  that  all  that  missions 
have  done  for  Great  Britain,  they  will  do  for  Japan, 
China,  Ceylon,  India,  and  all  the  islands  of  the  sea. 
I  found  it  often  helpful  to  remind  Britons  whom  I 
met  of  the  fact  that  Britain  was  once  the  home  of 
as  degraded  a  heathenism  as  is  now  seen  in  any 
heathen  land.  How  did  Britain  become  in  so  large 
a  degree  the  mistress  of  the  world  ? 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         221 

Our  forefathers  once  were  worshipers  of  idols 
and  once  offered  human  sacrifices  to  false  gods. 
Once  they  burned  these  sacrifices  in  large  numbers 
to  appease  the  wrath  of  their  deities.  While  under 
the  sway  of  Rome,  Britain  was  somewhat  Christian- 
ized, but  when  the  Roman  legions  were  withdrawn 
the  Anglo-Saxons  conquered  much  of  the  land  and 
it  lapsed  again  into  paganism.  Nearly  a  century 
after  Hengist  and  Horsa  landed,  Augustine  was 
sent,  in  596,  to  bring  some  of  the  people  back  to 
their  early  faith,  and  others  for  the  first  time,  to 
faith  in  Christianity.  It  is  affirmed  by  Dr.  Leonard 
that  it  was  not  until  King  Alfred's  day,  or  nearly 
four  hundred  years  after,  that  Britain  could  be  con- 
sidered Christian.  It  ought  not  then  to  be  con- 
sidered discouraging  that  the  mighty  peninsula  of 
India  is  still  largely  heathen  after  a  century  of 
Christian  service,  and  that  Christians  are  compara- 
tively few  in  vast  China,  whose  gates  have  been 
unbarred  to  Christian  missionaries  only  about  fifty 
years.  What  Britain  was  these  heathen  nations 
now  largely  are  ;  what  Britain  has  become  in  litera- 
ture and  in  all  forms  of  noble  civilization,  these  na- 
tions may  in  considerable  part  become.  No  man 
with  Anglo-Saxon  blood  in  his  veins  ought  to  be 
found  sneering  at  missions  and  missionaries  to-day 
in  Asiatic  lands.  These  lawless  Europeans  bring 
the  blush  of  shame  to  the  cheek  of  European  and 
American  missionaries.  The  heathen  people  too 
often  make  no  distinction  between  Christian  and 
non-Christian  Europeans  ;  they  regard  them  all  as 


222    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

Christians,  only  the  more  intelHgent  make  the  dis- 
tinction which  we  are  accustomed  to  observe  at 
home.  Too  often  these  Europeans  trample  upon 
every  law  of  purity,  of  humanity,  and  of  God,  in 
their  relations  with  heathen  peoples.  Their  tes- 
timony against  missions  is  utterly  invalid ;  their 
testimony  is  often  an  attempt  at  justification  of  their 
own  immorality.  Nearly  the  whole  Eurasian  race 
is  a  witness  against  the  lives  of  Europeans  in  Asiatic 
countries.  In  the  providence  of  God  the  social 
sins  of  men  may  be  overruled  for  the  advancement 
of  races  and  for  the  glory  of  God.  Never  was  I 
so  profoundly  convinced  of  the  necessity  of  the 
gospel  to  save  the  nations  as  I  am  at  this  moment. 

THESE    PRINCIPLES    AND    THE   JAPANESE. 

We  sometimes  hear  it  said  that  such  a  people  as 
the  Japanese,  in  many  respects  so  refined,  so  cul- 
tured, so  artistic,  and  so  gentle,  do  not  need  the 
gospel  of  Christ.  Those  who  so  affirm  are  ignorant 
of  the  social  life  of  the  Japanese  people.  What 
has  their  Shintoism  done  for  them  ?  It  is  at  best 
but  an  embodiment  of  crude  superstitions  ;  it  is 
simply  nature-worship,  hero-worship,  and  ancestor- 
worship.  It  is  a  philosophical  system  rather  than 
a  religion  ;  it  utterly  lacks  moral  earnestness  ;  it  is 
really  a  Pantheon  of  demi-gods.  Even  Buddhism 
has  been  more  educational  in  its  influence  than 
Shintoism.  Buddhism  is  an  improvement  on  the 
childish  system  of  nature  worship  ;  Buddhism  has 
given  the  people  some  realization  of  rewards  and 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         223 

punishments.  It  has  also  presented  a  higher  con- 
ception of  humanity,  and  a  somewhat  nobler  stand- 
ard of  ethics  ;  it  has  also  stimulated  some  degree 
of  intellectual  activity  and  of  devotion  to  philosophy, 
poetry,  and  literature ;  it  has  also,  nominally  at 
least,  taught  a  greater  degree  of  self-restraint  than 
does  Shintoism  ;  but  it  has  not  successfully  con- 
trolled the  evil  tendencies  of  human  nature. 

Recent  statistics  show  that  there  is  over  one  di- 
vorce to  every  three  marriages  in  Japan.  The 
common  people  have  been  instructed  almost  wholly 
in  Buddhism,  but  love  of  truth  and  the  practice  of 
chastity,  for  their  own  sake,  are  certainly  not  na- 
tional virtues.  Indeed,  it  has  been  frequently  af- 
firmed by  writers  competent  to  judge,  that  lying 
and  licentiousness  are  national  vices.  One  cannot 
before  a  promiscuous  audience  speak  of  the  long- 
established  institutions  regulated  by  law  which  are 
found  in  large  cities  and  seaport  towns.  One  mar- 
vels that  parents  virtually  sell  their  daughters  to 
vicious  lives,  and  that  often  such  lives  are  considered 
as  in  a  sense  meritorious  because  contributing  to 
the  support  of  parents.  Before  the  introduction  of 
Christianity,  and  for  some  time  after,  until  its  in- 
fluence was  practically  felt,  the  grossness  of  im- 
morality in  Japan  was  so  astounding  as  to  be  almost 
incredible  in  our  day  ;  the  most  abominable  shrines 
were  found  along  the  roads  and  in  the  provinces 
and  were  sold  by  thousands  in  the  shops.  The 
most  indecent  figures,  it  is  authoritatively  stated, 
were  made  of  confectionery,  of  porcelain,  and  of 


224    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

faience.  These  were  carried  at  the  temple  festivals 
and  at  picnics,  in  the  arms  or  on  the  shoulders  in 
the  public  processions,  and  the  performances  ac- 
companying the  display  of  these  emblems  were 
incredibly  abominable.  Much  of  the  literature  of 
the  time  could  not  be  translated  into  English 
speech.  Fortunately  the  symbols  of  which  I  have 
spoken  were  abolished  by  edict  in  1872.  I  do  not 
speak  of  the  promiscuous  intermingling  of  the  sexes 
in  public  bathhouses,  as  conventionalities  so  often 
set  up  standards  of  propriety  ;  but  the  recognized 
forms  of  immorality,  of  idolatry,  and  of  revolting 
superstition  are  yet  as  common  as  they  are  repre- 
hensible. My  esteemed  friend,  Dr.  Verbeck,  whose 
acquaintance  was  most  valuable  to  me,  affirms  that 
the  immorality  of  Japan  is  probably  a  more  for- 
midable foe  to  Christianity  than  is  the  idolatry  of 
Japan. 

THE    CONDITION    IN    INDIA. 

It  is  not  otherwise  in  India.  It  is  not  too  mucn 
to  say  that  idolatry  is  organized  impurity.  There 
are  temples  in  India  on  whose  walls,  carved  in 
stone,  are  representations  which  do  not  admit  of 
characterization  before  this  audience.  One  has 
only  to  visit  Benares,  the  capital  of  heathenism,  to 
see  the  horrible  vileness  of  heathen  faiths.  This  is 
the  most  sacred  of  all  the  sacred  cities  of  Hindu- 
ism. Hither  come  pilgrims  from  all  parts  of  India 
to  bathe  in  the  Ganges.  They  are  happy  if  they 
can  die  in  the  sacred  waters.      I  never  before  saw 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         225 

how  abominable  a  city  could  become.  What  Je- 
rusalem was  to  the  Jew  in  the  early  day,  and  Rome 
to  the  Latin,  Mecca  to  the  Mohammedan,  that  and 
more  Benares  is  now  to  the  Hindu.  When  Rome 
was  unknown  and  Athens  was  in  its  youth,  Benares 
was  a  city  already  ancient  and  famous.  Driving 
into  the  city  one  sees  troops  of  pilgrims,  footsore 
and  weary,  who  have  measured  their  length  over 
the  ground  for  a  thousand  miles  to  bathe  in  the 
holy  river.  There  is  a  strange  mingling  of  ages, 
races,  and  sexes  on  the  banks  and  in  the  waters  of 
the  river.  The  pilgrims  are  here  from  the  extreme 
north  and  extreme  south  of  India  ;  they  know  no 
language  in  which  they  can  make  themselves  under- 
stood by  one  another,  but  they  are  here  for  a  com- 
mon purpose.  Here  in  this  sacred  city  is  the 
temple  in  which  a  certain  sort  of  worship  is  offered 
to  monkeys.  Here  are  sacred  bulls  ;  here  is  the 
so-called  well  of  knowledge  ;  here  are  the  foulest 
sights  and  the  most  abominable  odors  ;  sacred 
cattle  obstruct  the  streets  and  render  them  unfit 
for  foot-passage  ;  and  here  are  the  foul  tanks  which 
have  frequently  become  hot-beds  of  pestilence.  It 
is  said  that  there  are  over  two  thousand  temples 
and  shrines  in  Benares,  and  they  are  all  in  every 
stage  of  filth,  ruin,  and  vileness. 

I  have  only  touched  upon  these  horrid  facts, 
and  I  have  spoken  far  within  the  truth.  We  saw 
heathenism  at  the  Parliament  of  Religions  with  some 
degree  of  Christian  clothing,  Christian  culture,  and 
Christian  propriety  ;  but  in  Benares  one  sees  it  in  its 


226    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

natural  and  indescribable  vileness.  If  one  had  any 
faith  whatever  in  God  and  in  eternal  things,  and  any 
regard  for  man,  he  ought  to  send  missionaries  to 
heathenism  because  of  Christianity's  inculcation  of 
sanitary  laws  and  of  humanitarian  impulses,  and 
because  it  gives  medical  help  to  suffering,  sorrow- 
ing, dying  men  and  women.  No  man  with  a  spark 
of  true  humanity  in  his  breast,  not  to  speak  of 
eternal  things,  can  fail  to  be  interested  in  the  sub- 
ject of  missions  in  heathen  countries  if  he  knows 
the  facts  regarding  the  degradation  of  men  and  the 
awful  suffering  of  women, 

ABLEST    MEN    FOR    FOREIGN    FIELDS, 

We  need,  in  the  second  place,  our  ablest  men 
for  work  in  foreign  fields.  There  are  men  who  are 
able  in  a  very  real  sense  because  of  their  fuller 
consecration  to  the  honor  of  Christ  and  the  salva- 
tion of  men.  These  workers  may  not  be  so  able 
from  a  purely  intellectual  point  of  view  as  are  other 
workers,  but  they  can  render  noble  service  because 
of  their  superior  devotion  ;  but  we  need  men  of 
the  highest  intellectual  culture  as  well  as  the  deepest 
spiritual  consecration.  The  work  to  be  performed 
is  more  difficult  in  many  ways  than  the  work  in  the 
home  field.  Difficult  languages  have  to  be  mas- 
tered. It  is  possible  to  do  some  work  in  preaching 
through  interpreters,  but  the  interpreter  is  a  barrier 
between  the  speaker  and  hearer.  No  man  can 
pour  out  his  soul  with  the  fervor  and  power  which 
are  in  him  when  the  stream  of  thought  has  to  pass 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         22/ 

through  the  mind  of  another  man.  The  acquisi- 
tion of  a  difficult  language  is  with  most  men  the 
labor  of  many  years.  Where  a  man  knows  the 
field  to  which  he  is  going,  he  might  do  something 
before  leaving  home  toward  acquiring  the  language 
of  the  people  to  whom  he  is  sent.  It  is  inconceiv- 
able that  a  man  who  has  never  studied  any  of  the 
modern  languages,  has  not  studied  Hebrew,  Greek, 
or  Latin,  and  perhaps  has  not  thoroughly  mastered 
English,  can  after  years  of  diligent  labor  get  even 
a  working  knowledge  of  Japanese,  Chinese,  and 
the  various  tribal  dialects  of  India.  Probably  it  is 
true  that  but  few  missionaries  have  a  reasonable 
mastery  of  the  languages  of  the^  countries  to  which 
they  have  gone.  It  is  said  that  an  educated  Chinese 
closing  his  eyes  and  listening  to  our  own  heroic 
and  beloved  Dr.  Ashmore,  could  not  tell  but  that 
he  was  listening  to  a  learned  mandarin.  Dr.  Ver- 
beck  has  made  a  similar  mastery  of  the  Japanese, 
and  several  of  our  noble  Baptist  missionaries  in 
Japan  are  no  mean  scholars  in  the  Japanese  lan- 
guage and  literature.  We  have,  taking  them  as  a 
whole,  a  most  intelligent  and  consecrated  body  of 
Baptist  men  and  women  as  our  representatives  in 
Japan. 

We  must  strive  to  put  the  standard  still  higher 
in  all  our  mission  fields.  Where  dictionaries  and 
grammars  and  translations  of  the  Bible  have  to  be 
made,  thorough  scholars  are  an  absolute  necessity. 
They  are  necessary  also  in  laying  the  foundations  of 
great  Christian  enterprises  in  these  foreign  fields. 


228    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Their  work  in  this  respect  is  far  more  difficult  than 
the  work  at  home.  They  need  to  be  masters  of 
church  pohty,  famihar  with  business  methods,  and 
with  all  the  means  by  which  men  may  be  reached 
for  Christ.  In  dealing  with  the  representatives  of 
various  heathen  faiths  our  missionaries  ought  to 
manifest  a  masterful  knowledge  of  these  faiths. 
Many  otherwise  ignorant  heathen  are  thoroughly 
familiar  with  the  traditions  and  philosophies  of  the 
ethnic  religions.  A  tyro  in  these  studies  would  be 
pitiably  helpless  in  the  hands  of  these  experts. 
There  are  many  heathen  trained  in  Christian 
schools  who  do  not  become  disciples  of  the  Chris- 
tian faith.  All  their  native,  subtle,  and  philosophic 
tendencies  and  attainments  are  reinforced  by  their 
Christian  education.  These  educated  heathen  are 
entirely  familiar  with  the  history  of  Great  Britain 
and  of  America,  with  the  literatures  of  both  coun- 
tries, with  the  philosophical  systems  of  many  na- 
tions, and  with  the  elements  of  weakness  in  the 
practical  working  of  Christian  faiths  and  govern- 
ments. They  will  discourse  learnedly  of  municipal 
politics  in  America  and  of  our  many  forms  of  social 
and  other  vices.  The  man  who  is  to  meet  these 
experts  must  be  no  novice  in  histoiy,  science,  and 
comparative  religions.  They  are  often  masterful 
men  within  their  special  spheres  of  thought  and 
argument. 

INFLUENCING    EUROPEANS. 

Our  missionaries  also  need  to  be  men  of  varied 
learning,  men  of  refined  social  manners,  and  men 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         229 

of  affairs,  in  order  rightly  to  influence  the  Europeans 
whom  they  meet  in  heathen  lands.  Many  of  these 
Europeans  are  college  men  engaged  in  various 
forms  of  scientific  and  other  pursuits  in  these  foreign 
countries.  They  are  in  danger,  because  of  their 
unfavorable  environment,  of  throwing  off  all  the  re- 
straints of  morality  and  religion.  There  is  a  wonder- 
ful field  for  missionary  work  among  Europeans  in 
the  land  called  heathen.  It  may  not  be  a  very 
hopeful  field  ;  indeed,  sometimes  it  is  well-nigh 
hopeless,  but  the  servant  of  God  cannot  be  indif- 
ferent to  the  needs  of  these  Europeans.  Their  im- 
moral lives  greatly  retard  the  work  of  missions 
among  the  heathen.  For  their  own  sake,  as  well 
as  because  of  the  evil  influence  they  often  exert 
among  the  native  people,  we  ought  to  strive  to 
lead  them  to  Christ ;  our  missionaries  ought  to  be 
of  such  a  character  and  to  possess  such  training 
that  they  can  freely  mingle  with  and  greatly  influ- 
ence for  truth  and  God  these  great  classes  of  Eu- 
ropeans. Many  of  them  are  young  men  away 
from  all  restraints  of  family  and  church  ;  and  their 
case  makes  a  powerful  and  tender  appeal  to  the 
hearts  of  men  of  God.  Many  of  them  are  engaged 
in  great  business  enterprises  and  have  hundreds  of 
natives  under  their  control.  If  thoroughly  con- 
verted they  would  be  a  marvelous  power  for  God. 

In  India,  especially,  there  are  the  thousands  of 
soldiers  with  their  officers.  I  took  great  pains  to 
learn  much  regarding  the  moral  life  of  these  young 
men.     The  facts  saddened  my  heart     The  religious 


230    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

influences  about  them  are  too  often  formal,  per- 
functory, and  so  largely  powerless.  I  was  greatly 
moved  on  their  behalf  They  are  nominally  Chris- 
tian ;  many  of  them,  I  regret  to  say,  are  practically 
heathen.  Some  of  them,  I  fear,  bring  curses  and 
not  blessings  to  the  heathen  populations.  It  would 
be  worth  much  for  God  and  humanity  if  the  mis- 
sionaries from  America  could  reach  large  numbers 
of  these  soldiers.  Some  of  our  missionaries  do 
reach  them  to  some  degree  ;  some  of  our  mission- 
aries also  reach,  in  considerable  numbers,  the  Eu- 
rasian people,  but  it  seems  as  if  new  movements 
should  be  made  on  all  these  lines.  I  was  pro- 
foundly impressed  with  the  idea  that  the  Salvation 
Army  has  accomplished  but  little  in  India.  There 
is  here  a  great  field  for  earnest  and  fruitful  labor 
for  the  honor  of  Christ  and  the  salvation  of  men 
nominally  Christian.  Similar  remarks  would  apply 
to  the  large  numbers  of  seamen  visiting  the  seaports 
of  heathen  countries.  In  their  case,  as  in  the  case 
of  soldiers,  there  are  vast  opportunities  for  good. 

SUCCESS    AND    ABILITY. 

Men  of  the  highest  character  and  of  the  fullest 
culture  are  needed  even  more  in  foreign  fields  than 
at  home.  In  one  sense  there  are  now  no  foreign 
fields.  The  world  is  one  ;  there  are  now  no  hermit 
nations.  India  is  as  near  New  York  now  as  Lon- 
don was  a  little  more  than  a  generation  ago.  The 
newspapers  in  India  contain  graphic  reports  of 
boat-races  and  some  other  public  matters,  in  Amer- 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         23  I 

ica.  There  are,  of  course,  outlying  regions  in  all 
these  foreign  countries  which  are  away  from  cen- 
ters of  international  knowledge  and  interest,  but 
strictly  speaking  the  world  is  one  as  never  before 
in  its  histoiy.  This  fact  may  rob  missions  of  some 
of  the  romantic  charms  which  once  surrounded  la- 
bor in  foreign  lands  ;  but  it  has  more  than  com- 
pensating advantages.  Telegraphs  and  telephones 
now  girdle  the  world  ;  the  remotest  mission  station 
is  in  close  touch  with  Boston.  It  is  now  no  great 
deprivation  to  live  in  Japan  or  Indian  cities,  or 
even  in  country  districts.  Whatever  of  culture  is 
necessaiy  at  home  is  emphatically  necessary  abroad. 
It  has  always  been  true  that  men  of  power  make 
themselves  felt  wherever  their  lot  is  cast.  Some 
missionaries  in  Japan  are  in  close  touch  with  civil 
and  military  officers  of  the  highest  character.  The 
Roman  Church  in  French  Canada  never  could  have 
secured  its  influence  but  for  the  great  and  learned 
men  who  were  its  first  missionaries.  The  patient 
Lalemont  and  the  heroic  Brebeuf,  whose  history  is 
so  vividly  told  by  Mr.  Francis  Parkman  in  connec- 
tion with  the  history  of  Jesuit  missions  in  Canada, 
were  men  of  apostolic  zeal  and  of  corresponding  in- 
tellectual power.  They  have  left  the  impress  of 
their  personality  in  the  Roman  Church  in  Canada 
to  this  hour.  They  were  men  of  high  social  stand- 
ing in  France  ;  they  were  men  of  learning  and  men 
of  consecration. 

On  May  6,  1542,  the  illustrious  Francis  Xavier 
landed  in  Goa,  India.      He  belonged  to  the  high 


232    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

nobility  of  Spain  ;  he  was  distinguished  for  learning 
and  for  eloquence.  To  the  time  of  his  death  he 
never  ceased  to  use  all  his  powers  for  the  pros- 
perity' of  the  order  and  the  church  to  which  he  be- 
longed. The  influence  of  Carey  and  Marshman,  of 
Judson  and  Boardman,  of  MacKay,  of  Livingstone, 
and  of  other  learned  and  consecrated  men  in  vari- 
ous countries,  will  be  as  enduring  as  the  churches 
which  they  founded.  These  men  never  could 
have  had  the  power  which  they  exercised  for  God 
but  for  their  broad  scholarship  and  their  deep  con- 
secration. Consecration  is  good.  Consecration  is 
indispensable,  but  no  amount  of  pietj'  will  sanctify 
stupidit}'.  The  Apostle  Paul  did  more  work  than 
all  the  other  apostles  put  together.  His  broad 
scholarship  was  matched  by  his  fiery  zeal  and  by 
his  whole-hearted  devotion.  Whatever  makes  men 
of  this  stamp  necessary  at  home  makes  them  vastly 
more  necessar}'  abroad.  We  ought  earnestly  to 
pray  for  men  of  this  high  order  as  candidates  for 
foreign  fields.  Missionar}'  Boards  cannot  send  men 
who  do  not  apply  to  be  sent.  The  responsibilitx', 
therefore,  rests  largely  with  the  churches  ;  it  rests 
largely  with  the  pastors.  Missionary'  Boards  will 
do  well  often  to  say  no,  with  emphasis,  when  me- 
diocre men  apply  for  appointments.  The  best  in- 
vestment the  churches  can  make  is  in  men  of  the 
right  stamp  ;  the  poorest  investment  they  can  make 
is  in  men  of  the  opposite  character. 

Appointment  to  a  foreign  field  should   be  the 
highest  honor  in  the  gift  of  the  Baptist  denomina- 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         233 

tion.  Candidates  for  this  high  honor  should  be 
thoroughly  tested  and  proved  before  their  appoint- 
ment is  made.  To  pass  the  requisite  examination 
should  be  the  holy  ambition  of  our  best  men  in 
colleges  and  seminaries  ;  to  prepare  men  to  pass 
this  examination  should  be  the  endeavor  of  college 
and  theological  professors.  It  may  be  said  that 
men  of  the  great  ability  of  those  named  are  not 
often  found  for  fields  either  at  home  or  abroad. 
Doubtless  the  statement  is  correct ;  but  they  would 
be  oftener  found  if  they  were  sought  out,  encour- 
aged, and  made  the  subject  of  special  prayer  by  our 
churches.  The  highest  angel  before  God's  throne 
would  be  honored  in  being  sent  in  Christian  service 
to  the  lowest  peoples.  The  conversion  of  the  world 
will  be  seen  when  men  of  great  natural  ability,  and 
vast  learning,  and  of  the  deepest  consecration,  are 
sent  to  foreign  fields.  We  want  no  kindergarten 
theological  seminaries  to  train  foreign  missionaries. 
Such  institutions  may  train  men  who  can  render 
service  as  business  men  or  in  other  forms  of  work 
as  laymen  in  foreign  lands  ;  but  men  so  trained 
are  not  capable  of  mastering  the  enormous  diffi- 
culties encountered  in  foreign  mission  work.  May 
God  stir  up  our  churches  to  pray  earnestly  for 
additional  and  thoroughly  equipped  laborers  in 
the  Master's  great  vineyard  at  home  and  abroad  ! 

THE    CONVERSION    OF    LEARNED    NATIVES. 

We  need  also,  in  the  next  place,  earnestly  to 
pray  and  faithfully  to  labor  for  the  conversion  of  great 


234    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

men  who  are  natives  in  foreign  lands.  It  is  true, 
still,  as  it  was  in  the  days  of  the  apostles,  "  That  not 
many  wise  men  after  the  flesh,  not  many  mighty, 
not  many  noble,  are  called."  It  is  still  true  that, 
"  God  hath  chosen  the  foolish  things  of  the  world 
to  confound  the  wise  ;  and  God  hath  chosen  the 
weak  things  of  the  world  to  confound  the  things 
which  are  mighty  ;  and  base  things  of  the  world, 
and  things  which  are  despised,  hath  God  chosen, 
yea,  and  things  which  are  not,  to  bring  to  naught 
things  that  are  ;  that  no  flesh  should  glory  in  his 
presence." 

We  thoroughly  believe  that  the  foolishness  of 
God  is  wiser  than  men,  and  the  weakness  of  God  is 
stronger  than  men  ;  nevertheless  God  has  often 
chosen  men  trained  to  oppose  his  gospel,  to  be- 
come its  heroic  defenders.  The  conversion  of 
learned  Brahmins  and  others  in  high  rank  would 
be  a  wonderful  achievement  for  the  gospel ;  it 
would  illustrate  the  gospel's  power  and  would 
greatly  advance  the  kingdom  of  Jesus  Christ ;  it 
would  bring  confusion  and  dismay  to  the  supporters 
of  heathenism  and  joy  and  triumph  to  the  preachers 
of  Christ.  The  kingdom  of  God  can  never  make 
the  most  rapid  strides  in  heathen  lands  until  con- 
verted heathen  are  its  preachers.  Dr.  Alexander 
Duff  has  well  remarked,  that  as  a  rule  the  great 
European  reformers  were  natives  of  the  kingdoms 
which  under  God  they  reformed.  Luther  never 
could,  as  he  reminds  us,  have  done  the  work  in 
any  other  country  which  he  did  in  Germany.     He 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         235 

was  trained  to  support  the  Roman  Church,  and 
being  thus  familiar  with  her  elements  of  strength 
and  weakness,  -he  did  mighty  service  in  opposing 
her  errors.  In  Germany,  Luther  and  Melanchthon 
were  well-nigh  irresistible  ;  they  knew  the  German 
character ;  they  were  masters  of  all  the  idioms  of 
the  German  tongue.  Luther,  as  Dr.  Duff  rightly 
suggests,  would  have  been  comparatively  powerless 
in  Scotland.  He  would  have  been  in  Scotland  an 
eagle  encaged.  He  could  not  acquire  the  minute 
knowledge  of  the  idioms  of  Scottish  speech  and  he 
would  always  have  been  comparatively  ignorant  of 
Scottish  traits.  He  never  could  have  been  a  great 
reformer  in  Scotland.  Beza  and  Calvin  were  mighty 
in  Switzerland,  but  they  could  not  have  been  one 
tithe  as  powerful  in  an  English-speaking  country. 
Knox  was  the  thunderbolt  of  God  in  Scotland,  but 
he  would  have  been  comparatively  weak  in  Germany 
or  Switzerland.  Latimer  and  Ridley  exercised 
vast  power  in  England,  but  if  transplanted  to  some 
country  on  the  continent,  they  would  have  been 
shorn  of  much  influence  and  would  never  have 
left  enduring  monuments  of  their  consecrated  zeal. 
God  never  wastes  power  ;  he  never  unnecessarily 
multiplies  miracles ;  he  qualifies  men  by  giving 
them  minute  familiarity  with  the  domestic,  social, 
civil,  and  religious  characteristics  of  a  people. 
These  qualities  cannot  really  be  communicated  to 
a  stranger ;  one  must  grow  up  in  the  atmosphere 
and  absorb  the  distinctive  characteristics  of  a  na- 
tion, that  he  may  greatly  move  it  in  religious  work. 


236    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

No  foreigner  can  fully  strike  the  secret  chords  of  a 
nation's  heart.  God  always  wisely  adapts  and  care- 
fully qualifies  his  great  servants  for  their  great 
work.  The  real  reformers  of  India  must  be  In- 
dians ;  of  Japan,  Japanese  ;  of  China,  Chinese ;  and 
so  of  all  the  other  countries  of  the  globe.  We 
ought  most  earnestly  to  pray  that  God  may  make 
bare  his  arm  in  the  conversion  of  the  leaders  of 
Hinduism,  of  Shintoism,  of  Buddhism,  of  Brahmin- 
ism,  and  every  other  "ism  "  opposed  to  the  gospel 
of  Jesus  Christ.  When  such  men  are  brought  into 
the  kingdom  of  God,  the  kingdom  of  Satan  will 
tremble.  Great  national  awakenings  must  come, 
on  their  human  side,  from  great  national  leaders. 
For  this  reason,  as  for  other  reasons,  we  need  our 
strongest  men  in  foreign  fields  to  grapple  with 
Satan  in  his  strongholds.  God  has  given  us  some 
such  men  in  every  country  in  which  we  are  now 
laboring.  May  he  give  them  power  to  confront 
every  form  of  heathen  faith  with  the  gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ ;  may  they  be  able,  as  did  the  Apostle  Paul, 
to  confound  the  reasoning  of  heathen  philosophers 
and  the  superstitions  of  heathen  mythologists  ! 
Perhaps  we  have  not  taken  this  special  phase  of 
mission  work  to  heart  as  we  ought.  Is  not  the 
time  ripe  now  for  laboring  and  praying  as  never 
before,  for  the  conversion  of  the  leaders  of  heathen 
thought  in  every  land  ?  Shall  we  not  hold  up 
Japan,  that  is  now  turning  its  face  toward  the  light 
of  civilization  and  the  Sun  of  Righteousness,  in  the 
arms  of  our  faith  to  God  that  he  may  convert  her 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         237 

great  men,  bringing  them  into  sweet  subjection  to 
Jesus  Christ? 

During  the  recent  war  with  China,  Christianity 
was  on  trial  as  fully  as  was  Japan's  skill  and  brav- 
ery. Wonderful  was  the  favor  which  men  in 
authority  gave  to  the  word  of  God  as  distributed 
among  the  soldiers  of  Japan  ;  great  were  the  honors 
given  to  Christian  soldiers.  Many  of  our  Baptist 
Christians  were  as  heroic  for  Christ  on  the  battlefield 
as  they  were  for  the  honor  of  their  nation.  The  war 
was  a  victory  for  Christian  civilization  and  for  Chris- 
tian confession  as  truly  as  for  Japanese  loyalty  and 
bravery.  God  used  it  to  honor  his  ministers  and  to 
glorify  his  Son.  Vast  China  cannot  long  resist  the 
power  of  the  newer  civilization  which  she  must  ex- 
perience before  the  twentieth  century  shall  be  long 
upon  us.  Already  India  feels  the  throb  of  the 
Christian  activity  of  the  past  one  hundred  years. 
Great  and  good  men  have  been  laboring  long  under 
ground,  and  the  first  quarter  in  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury will  probably  see  greater  results  for  Christian- 
ity than  the  entire  nineteenth  century  produced. 
Foundations  have  been  laid  ;  the  structure  will 
now  be  erected.  Much  time  was  necessarily  spent 
in  learning  languages,  making  grammars,  diction- 
aries, and  translations  ;  this  work  has  now  been 
done.  These  great  countries  will  soon  be  a  net- 
work of  railways  ;  China  cannot  forever  resist  the 
tendencies  of  progress.  The  trans-Siberian  railway 
will  be  a  spinal  column  connecting  far  separated 
countries  and  nations  lone  removed  from  one  an- 


238    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

other.  Marvelous  are  the  blessed  results  which  will 
soon  be  seen  among  all  the  nations  under  heaven. 
God  will  turn  and  overturn  until  his  Son  shall  reign. 
Civil  and  religious  liberty  will  be  had  by  nations 
long  in  bondage,  and  the  fuller  freedom  which  only 
Christ  can  give  will  be  the  blessed  possession  of  all 
the  nations  of  the  earth.      God  hasten  the  day  ! 

REVIVAL    OF    MISSIONARY   ZEAL. 

We  need,  in  the  last  place,  a  great  revival  of 
missionary  zeal  and  consecration  at  home  and 
abroad.  There  must  be  coldness  at  the  extremities 
if  there  is  coldness  at  the  heart.  Anti-mission 
churches  are  anti-Christian  churches.  Men  are  un- 
worthy the  Christian  name  who  do  not  desire  that 
all  others  should  share  the  blessings  of  Christianity. 
Those  who  selfishly  hoard  their  blessings  inevitably 
lose  their  blessings.  Only  those  who  are  willing  to 
lose  their  lives  for  Christ's  sake,  and  their  brethren's 
sake,  do  truly  find  their  lives  for  time  and  for  eter- 
nity. Only  those  who  appreciate  for  the  heathen 
the  salvation  which  the  Son  of  God  came  to  bring 
to  the  earth,  can  rightly  appreciate  that  salvation 
for  themselves.  We  must  rise  to  a  proper  concep- 
tion of  our  high  calling  as  the  ambassadors  of  Jesus 
Christ.  We  must  send  the  gospel  for  the  sake  of 
the  heathen  who  will  perish  without  it,  and  also  for 
our  own  sake  lest  we  perish  from  neglect  of  our 
duty.  The  church  of  Christ  is  largely  asleep  re- 
garding its  privileges  and  obligations  to  give  the 
gospel  to  the  world.     We  need  consecrated  enter- 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         239 

prise  ;  we  need  more  men  who  will  give  their  ripest 
thought  to  planning  for  the  spread  of  the  kingdom 
of  God  ;  we  need  more  men  who  shall  feel  that  the 
greatest  honor  beneath  God's  heavens  is  to  labor 
for  the  salvation  of  men  at  home  and  abroad.  We 
need  a  baptism  of  spiritual  power  and  consecrated 
grace  ;  we  need  more  men  who  shall  be  as  a  flame 
of  fire  in  their  zeal  for  God  and  the  heathen. 

Already  with  the  close  of  the  century  men  are 
planning  for  new  methods  of  work  in  heathen 
lands.  "A  New  Programme  of  Missions"  is  the 
title  of  a  booklet  by  Luther  D.  Wishard  ;  in  this 
little  volume  he  suggests  several  solutions  of  the 
problem  as  to  how  best  to  enlist  all  our  forces  for 
the  world's  evangelization.  The  students'  Christian 
movements  in  our  own  country  is  one  of  the  meth- 
ods which  has  in  it  signs  of  hope.  He  also  finds 
encouragement  in  the  Christian  work  among  stu- 
dents in  the  far  East,  and  especially  in  the  distinc- 
tively Christian  colleges  of  mission  lands. 

But  after  all  we  have  not  reached  the  true  solu- 
tion of  the  problem  ;  it  must  find  its  solution  in  a 
deeper  consecration  of  ourselves  to  Christ's  work 
in  every  land.  When  that  spirit  of  consecration 
comes,  the  money  power  of  the  world  will  be  con- 
secrated to  Christ.  When  that  consecration  comes, 
we  shall  feel  that  missionary  work  is  our  highest 
honor  on  earth  and  will  bring  the  richest  reward 
in  heaven.  Would  to  God  that  the  consecrating 
touch  of  the  hand  pierced  upon  the  cross  might 
now   be  put  upon  all  the  churches  of  America  ! 


240    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

What  are  we  waiting  for?  All  the  doors  into 
heathenism  are  wide  open.  When  we  rise  to  an 
appreciation  of  our  privileges  the  morning  of  the 
new  day  will  dawn  in  heathen  lands  ;  then  the 
morning  stars  will  sing  together,  and  all  the  sons 
of  God  will  shout  for  joy.  Let  us  revive  the  mis- 
sionary concert  in  all  our  churches.  Let  us  pray 
as  never  before  that  the  Lord  may  send  forth  la- 
borers into  his  harvest.  Let  us  be  willing  to  go, 
and  to  have  our  sons  and  daughters  be  thoroughly 
prepared  to  go,  should  God  honor  them  with  a 
call ;  and  let  us  bring  all  the  tithes  into  the  store- 
house of  the  Lord.  Then  a  new  day  of  creation 
will  begin,  then  tidal  waves  of  power  from  God  will 
flow  over  the  world  as  the  tides  now  sweep  over 
the  bosom  of  the  sea  ;  then  the  crimson  and  gold 
of  millennial  day  will  color  the  eastern  sky  ;  then 
earth  and  heaven  will  join  hands  and  the  whole 
world  will  be  radiant  with  the  glory  of  the  Lord. 

The  propaganda  of  religious  faith  among  heathen 
nations  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  John  Henry  Barrows,  late 
President  of  "The  World's  Parliament  of  Relig- 
ions," may  have  m  it  elements  of  hope  for  the 
world's  redemption.  I  have  read  with  much  in- 
terest the  farewell  address  delivered  by  Dr.  Bar- 
rows in  New  York  before  he  went  on  his  mission 
to  the  educated  Hindus.  He  will  attempt  to  argue 
the  coming  triumph  of  Christianity  because  it  pre- 
sents to  men,  in  the  Bible,  the  only  volume  worthy 
to  become  the  sacred  text-book  of  the  race.  In 
this   address   he   proves   in  glowing   language   the 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS         24 1 

superiority  of  the  Bible  to  all  the  other  sacred  books 
of  humanity.  He  shows  that  it  has  lifted  the  mind 
and  transformed  the  life  and  given  to  human  dark- 
ness the  light  of  the  celestial  world  ;  that  this  book 
is  the  fountain  of  the  educational  systems  of  the 
new  world,  giving  us  our  public  schools,  our  Chris- 
tian colleges,  and  our  republican  institutions  ;  that 
it  was  an  echo  of  the  Scriptures  that  sounded 
through  the  best  lines  of  the  Declaration  of  Inde- 
pendence ;  that  from  it  sprang  the  reformations 
which  destroyed  the  barbarism  of  slavery  and  made 
it  possible  for  Abraham  Lincoln  to  issue  the  Eman- 
cipation Proclamation  ;  that  the  English  language 
and  all  the  nations  speaking  the  Teutonic  tongues 
are  now  rapidly  increasing ;  that  forty-two  million 
square  miles  of  land  surface  are  to-day  under  the 
control  of  Christian  powers  ;  that  the  African  con- 
tinent will  soon  be  occupied  by  a  nation  speaking 
the  English  tongue,  and  Dr.  Barrows  quotes  John 
Fiske  as  saying,  "  that  the  day  is  at  hand  when 
four-fifths  of  the  human  race  will  trace  their  pedi- 
gree to  English  forefathers." 

Dr.  Barrows  further  shows  that  the  fundamental 
law  of  Christianity  is  the  law  of  life,  and  he  quotes 
one  as  saying  that,  "  Buddhism  brought  face  to 
face  with  the  problem  of  the  world's  evil  and  possi- 
ble improvement  evades  it,  begs  the  whole  question 
at  the  outset  ;  prays,  '  Deliver  us  from  existence  ! 
Save  us  from  life  and  give  us  as  little  of  it  as  pos- 
sible ! '  Christianity  faces  the  problem  and  flinches 
not ;  orders  advance  all  along  the  line  of  endeavor, 


242    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and  prays,  *  Deliver  us  from  evil '  ;  and  is  ever  of 
good  cheer  because  its  Captain  and  Leader  says, 
'  I  have  overcome  the  world,  go  win  it  for  me  !  I 
have  come  that  they  might  have  life,  and  that  they 
might  have  it  more  abundantly.'  " 

We  hope  for  the  best  from  the  institutes  which 
Dr.  Barrows  may  found.  The  time  is  soon  coming 
when  our  ablest  thinkers  in  America  and  Great 
Britain  will  go  to  India  and  Japan  to  discuss  the 
great  problems  of  life  and  immortality  ;  the  time  is 
coming  when  the  American  people  and  the  govern- 
ment at  Washington  will  appreciate  the  value  of 
American  missions  and  missionaries.  They  are 
most  humiliatingly  delinquent  in  this  regard  to- 
day. Every  kind  of  business  our  government 
seems  ready  to  protect  in  foreign  lands  except  the 
missionary  business.  A  banker,  a  brewer,  or  a 
shopkeeper  of  any  sort,  would  have  his  property 
protected  by  the  ships  of  the  United  States,  but 
both  the  government  and  the  people  seem  strangely 
indifferent  to  the  millions  of  property  invested  in 
missions  and  to  the  lives  of  consecrated  missionaries 
in  Armenia,  China,  and  other  lands.  Christianity 
has  had  a  grand  opportunity  of  showing  its  worth 
by  contrast  with  Mohammedanism  and  other  forms 
of  semi-heathenism  in  Armenia.  God  will  use  these 
terrible  recent  experiences  to  arouse  Christian  na- 
tions to  a  realization  of  the  value  of  missions  and 
to  rebuke  the  silly  fad  of  the  hour  which  endeavors 
to  depreciate  Christianity  and  to  glorify  the  cruel 
religions  of  the  Orient. 


PRESSING    NEEDS    OF    FOREIGN    FIELDS  243 

I  hope  and  pray  that  the  great  God  may  turn 
and  overturn,  shaking  the  tottering  throne  of  the 
tyrannical  sultan  even  though  both  throne  and 
sultan  should  fall  into  the  Bosphorus.  The  day  is 
coming  when  Christian  Britain  and  America  will 
feel  that  the  noblest  use  for  warships,  as  well  as 
ships  of  merchandise,  is  to  contribute  to  the  advance- 
ment of  the  kingdom  of  Jesus  Christ.  The  day  is 
coming  when  our  missionaries  will  receive  their 
guerdon  as  the  pioneers  of  civilization,  as  the  har- 
bingers of  international  amity,  and  as  the  founders 
of  enduring  temporal  prosperity,  as  truly  as  the 
heralds  of  the  glorious  gospel.  England  and 
America,  literature  and  science,  civilization  and 
humanity,  owe  more  than  any  words  can  adequately 
describe  to  the  preachers  of  the  gospel  in  lands 
that  long  lay  in  the  darkness  of  ignorance  and  sin. 
The  day  was  when  Great  Britain  sneered  with  Sid- 
ney Smith  at  William  Carey  as  "  the  consecrated 
cobbler,"  in  going  to  convert  the  heathen.  Many 
so-called  Christians,  as  well  as  men  of  the  world, 
believed  that  he  was  going  on  a  fool's  errand. 
The  years  passed,  and  Carey  is  dying  at  the  age  of 
seventy-three  ;  to  his  bedside  comes  the  Bishop  of 
India,  the  representative  of  the  Church  of  England 
in  that  great  peninsula,  the  representative  of  the 
church  to  which  Sidney  Smith  and  his  sneering  as- 
sociates belonged  ;  this  bishop  bows  his  head  at 
the  deathbed  of  Carey  and  invokes  the  blessing  of 
this  dying  and  now  sainted  and  immortal  mission- 
ary.    The  time  had  been  when  the  British  author- 


244    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

ities  denied  Carey  a  landing  place  when  he  strove 
to  reach  Bengal ;  now,  after  years  of  consecrated 
toil,  he  is  laying  aside  his  cross  for  his  crown,  and 
the  government  in  India  drops  all  its  flags  at  half- 
mast  ;  the  officials  learn  to  do  honor  to  a  man  who 
has  done  more  for  India  than  all  the  British  states- 
men and  generals  from  the  day  that  Britain  first 
put  foot  on  Indian  soil  to  this  hour.  The  day  is 
coming  when  the  whole  world  will  acknowledge  its 
indebtedness  to  Jesus  Christ  as  King  in  Zion,  and 
to  his  lowly  missionaries  as  heralds  of  all  that  is 
noblest  in  civilization,  all  that  is  sublimest  in  hu- 
manity, and  all  that  is  divinest  in  Christianity.  God 
hasten  the  day  when  the  kingdoms  of  this  world 
shall  become  the  kingdoms  of  our  Lord  and  Sav- 
iour Jesus  Christ ! 


X 

ESTABLISHING  OUR  WORK^ 

THE  establishment  of  all  forms  of  missionary 
work  is  the  very  heart  of  Christianity.  It 
opens  a  broad  field  for  effort  and  prayer.  The 
church  of  Christ  is  nothing  if  it  is  not  a  great  mis- 
sionary organization.  An  anti-mission  church  is 
an  anti-Christian  church.  Such  a  church  must  die, 
and  the  sooner  it  dies  the  better ;  but  beside  the 
dead  body  an  honest  minister  could  not  say, 
"Blessed  are  the  dead  who  die  in  the  Lord." 
For  such  a  church  God  has  no  use,  the  world  no 
respect,  and  the  devil  no  dread.  I  hope  the  time 
will  never  come  when  the  Calvary  Church  shall 
cease  to  be  interested  in  all  the  great  movements 
of  all  the  churches  for  the  conversion  of  the  world 
to  Jesus  Christ. 

The  gospel  is  the  harmonizer  of  all  the  conflict- 
ing experiences  of  human  society  ;  it  is  the  divine 
specific  for  sin.  It  comes  to  the  world  at  its  lowest 
and  darkest  point  with  help  and  hope.  Christ  was 
a  workingman  ;  his  apostles  were  workingmen  ;  all 
that  is  true  in  communism  is  the  offspring  of  Christ's 

^  Parts  of  the  discourse  delivered  in  Calvary  Church,  New  York 
City,  May  12,  1895,  in  connection  with  the  services  commemorat- 
ing the  twenty-fifth  anniversary  of  the  author's  pastorate  of  that 
church. 

24s 


246    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

religion  ;  and  all  that  is  evil  is  opposed  by  that 
gospel.  Christ's  religion  means  to  conquer  the 
world.  This  is  its  lofty  ambition  ;  this  is  its  divine 
destiny.  It  stands  unique  among  the  religions  of 
the  world,  because  it  knows  nothing  of  the  narrow- 
ness and  bigotry  of  Judaic  faith  or  of  classic  cul- 
ture. No  philosopher  of  Greece  or  Rome,  or  of 
the  imaginative  East,  ever  dreamed  of  a  universal 
religion.  Jesus  Christ  gave  that  idea  to  the  world, 
and  away  over  the  hills  of  Judea  and  Samaria  went 
his  apostles  preaching  a  gospel  needed  by,  intended 
for,  and  adapted  to,  all  men.  This  gospel  revolu- 
tionized literature,  architecture,  religion,  and  the 
world.  Jean  Paul  Richter  was  right  when  he  said  : 
"With  his  pierced  hand  Christ  has  lifted  empires 
off  their  hinges,  turned  the  stream  of  centuries  out 
of  its  channel,  and  he  still  governs  the  ages." 

God  has  greatly  blessed  the  Calvary  Church  in 
its  local,  city,  home,  and  foreign  mission  work.  God 
has  greatly  blessed  the  Baptist  denomination  in  its 
mission  work  in  every  land.  God  has  given  us 
the  honor  of  conducting  the  most  successful  forms 
of  mission  work  among  the  heathen  ever  known  in 
the  church  of  Christ.  We  have  seen  in  fields  under 
our  direction  days  of  more  than  pentecostal  power  ; 
we  have  seen  the  heathen  flocking  to  the  feet  of 
Christ,  to  the  waters  of  baptism,  and  to  the  table  of 
communion.  The  last  twenty-five  years  have  been 
a  time  of  constant  advancement  in  our  great  socie- 
ties at  home  and  abroad.  We  have  markedly 
changed  the  methods  of  work  in  progress  twenty- 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  247 

five  years  ago  ;  we  have  correspondingly  enlarged 
our  horizons  of  hope,  faith,  and  effort.  A  quarter 
of  a  century  ago  the  problem  was  to  find  mission- 
aries and  to  secure  open  doors  into  mission  fields  ; 
to-day  the  problem  is  to  find  money  to  support 
consecrated  men  and  women  who  are  ready  to 
enter  the  doors  providentially  opened. 

During  the  past  few  years  our  Home  Mission 
Society  has  supported  a  larger  number  of  laborers 
than  ever  before  in  its  remarkably  successful  history. 
In  1883  the  Livingstone  Inland  Mission  came  into 
our  hands.  In  these  great  foreign  fields  we  are 
maintaining  schools,  translating  the  Scriptures,  and 
distributing  many  forms  of  religious  literature.  We 
have  at  this  moment  in  our  foreign  field  about  three 
thousand  laborers,  including  native  preachers  and 
Bible  readers.  We  reported  last  year  over  thir- 
teen thousand  baptisms  and  a  church-membership 
of  more  than  one  hundred  and  seventy  thousand. 
During  the  period  covered  by  this  pastorate,  women 
have  come  into  great  prominence  as  missionary 
workers  in  raising  money  at  home  and  in  laboring 
abroad.  In  1871  two  foreign  missionary  societies, 
with  headquarters  in  Boston  and  Chicago,  were  or- 
ganized by  our  noble  Baptist  women.  They  now 
have  their  missionaries  in  Burma,  India,  China, 
and  Japan,  and  a  few  also  in  Europe  and  some  in 
Africa.  During  the  past  year  they  have  supported 
more  than  one  hundred  missionaries,  many  Bible 
women,  several  hundred  schools,  and  all  at  an  ex- 
pense of  about  two  hundred  thousand  dollars. 


248    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

In  1877  two  Home  Mission  Societies  were  or- 
ganized by  our  Baptist  women.  They  have  in 
Chicago  their  excellent  training  school  for  mission- 
ary workers.  In  1888  the  Women's  Missionary 
Union  was  formed,  auxiliar}-  to  the  Southern  Bap- 
tist Convention.  There  is  almost  no  limit  to  the 
possibilities  open  before  our  churches  in  mission 
fields  abroad  as  well  as  at  home.  The  great  chapter 
of  modern  missionary  work  is  the  history  of  the 
Ongole  mission  field.  On  the  east  coast  of  the 
great  Indian  Peninsula  is  the  field  of  the  Telugus. 
For  nearly  fifty  years  the  work  in  this  field  was 
well-nigh  hopeless  ;  at  one  time  it  seemed  certain 
that  the  mission  would  be  abandoned.  In  1876 
there  were  four  thousand  Christians  in  the  mission  ; 
then  came  the  wondrous  grace  and  mighty  power 
of  God.  and  more  than  nine  thousand  were  bap- 
tized within  sixty  days.  On  the  third  of  July,  1 878, 
two  thousand  two  hundred  and  twenty-tAvo  were 
baptized,  being  the  largest  number  baptized  in  a 
single  day  since  Pentecost 

When  the  Calvary  Church  was  on  Twenty-third 
street,  on  a  certain  Sunday  night  the  ordinance  of 
baptism  was  observed.  There  turned  into  the 
church  that  evening,  apparently  by  accident,  but 
doubtless  by  divine  direction,  a  young  Cuban  exile 
named  Alberto  J.  Diaz.  Mr.  Diaz  was  born  in 
Havana  in  1852,  was  graduated  from  the  university 
in  Havana,  and  then  studied  for  the  medical  pro- 
fession. Soon  after  completing  his  course  in  med- 
icine he  joined  a  movement  in  opposition  to  the 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  249 

government,  and  in  order  to  escape  capture  by- 
government  officials  he,  with  some  friends,  ventured 
out  into  the  sea  upon  planks  ;  and  while  his  friends 
were  lost,  he  was  found  by  a  vessel,  taken  aboard, 
and  brought  to  New  York.  This  patriotic  exile 
was  stricken  while  in  Brooklyn  by  what  seemed  to 
be  a  mortal  disease.  While  lying  ill  in  a  boarding 
house  he  was  converted  to  God  by  the  faithfulness 
of  a  young  Christian  woman  who  lived  in  the  same 
house  and  who  daily  read  to  him  the  Bible.  He 
was  raised  up  to  health  and  his  heart  was  on  fire 
with  missionary  zeal. 

His  great  desire  was  that  Cuba  should  know  Jesus 
Christ,  and  he  entered  the  Union  Theological  Semi- 
nary in  this  city  to  prepare  himself  for  the  Christian 
ministry.  Soon  after  he  was  baptized  in  Brook- 
lyn by  the  late  Rev.  R.  B.  Montgomery.  His  soul 
still  glowed  with  zeal  for  the  salvation  of  his  coun- 
trymen, and  in  1883  he  landed  in  Havana  with 
nothing  but  a  box  of  Bibles  and  his  faith  in  God. 
He  immediately  began  to  preach  the  glorious  gos- 
pel, but  the  Roman  Church,  true  to  all  its  history  of 
sectarian  bigotry  and  inquisitorial  persecution,  cast 
him  into  prison  ;  but  in  prison  he  preached  the  gos- 
pel. Our  government  finally  interfered  and  Diaz 
was  released.  He  continued  to  preach  in  Havana, 
and  men  and  women  were  converted  in  large  num- 
bers. He  had  no  book  to  guide  him  in  the  form 
of  church  government  which  should  be  adopted 
but  the  New  Testament,  and  the  New  Testament 
made  him  and  the  other  believers  Baptists.      For 


250    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

six  months  his  mother  refused  to  speak  to  him 
because  of  his  heresy  ;  but  she  herself  found  Christ 
as  a  personal  Saviour,  and  was  the  first  convert 
whom  he  baptized.  At  her  baptism,  he  failed  to 
repeat  the  usual  formula,  and  said  with  great  emo- 
tion, "O  Lord  Jesus,  this  is  my  mother." 

Six  years  pass  ;  it  is  now  1889,  and  there  were 
reported  twenty  missionaries,  twenty -seven  churches 
and  stations,  and  a  total  membership  of  nearly  one 
thousand  five  hundred.  Twelve  years  pass  ;  Brother 
Diaz  returns  for  occasional  visits  to  New  York,  re- 
ceives a  welcome  in  the  Calvary  Church  and  in 
e\'ery  church,  and  is  able  to  report  to  the  glory  of 
God  a  membership  of  two  thousand  five  hundred, 
besides  twenty-six  Sunday-schools  with  two  thou- 
sand two  hundred  and  twenty-eight  teachers  and 
scholars.  This  Cuban  work  is  one  of  the  marvels 
of  modern  Christendom,  and  gives  promise  of  con- 
stant enlargement  under  this  noble  man  of  God. 
One  of  the  greatest  events  during  the  last  twenty- 
five  years  in  the  history  of  Baptist  foreign  missions 
was  the  raising  in  1 892,  the  Centennial  year  of  the 
modern  missionary  movement,  of  one  million  dol- 
lars for  that  work.  This  enormous  undertaking 
was  wisely  planned,  vigorously  pushed,  and  triumph- 
antly concluded.  May  God  help  the  Calvary  Church, 
the  Baptist  denomination,  and  all  churches  of  Jesus 
Christ,  to  press  forward  in  their  mission  work  at 
home  and  abroad,  until  every  creature  shall  hear  the 
gospel,  and  all  the  world  shall  lie  in  sweet  submis- 
sion at  the  pierced  feet  of  Jesus  Christ ! 


ESTABLISHING    OUR   WORK  2$  I 

EDUCATIONAL   WORK. 

We  pray,  also,  that  God  may  establish  our  edu- 
cational work.  This  church  has  striven  to  do  its 
full  duty  in  general  and  denominational  educational 
work.  There  has  never  been  a  time  when  we  have 
not  had  a  large  number  of  students  in  high  schools, 
academies,  colleges,  theological  seminaries,  and 
other  professional  schools.  We  have,  at  this  time, 
a  goodly  number  who  are  engaged  in  preparing 
themselves  for  the  gospel  ministry  at  home  and  for 
mission  work  abroad.  Among  these  students  are 
representatives  of  several  nationalities,  as  in  the 
church  itself  there  are  as  many  nationalities  as  were 
present  on  the  day  of  Pentecost.  Our  interest  in, 
and  contributions  for,  educational  work  have  marked 
the  entire  pastorate.  During  the  last  twenty-five 
years  as  a  denomination  we  have  entered  upon  a 
new  era  in  educational  work  in  America.  No 
movement  has  been  more  marked  in  our  denomina- 
tional ranks,  and  perhaps  none  in  the  history  of  the 
country,  than  recent  educational  work  in  the  Bap- 
tist denomination.  There  were  among  our  Baptist 
fathers  those  who  did  not  attach  due  importance 
to  education  as  a  preparation  for  the  gospel  min- 
istry ;  but  new  men  and  new  movements  came  to 
the  front  a  century  ago,  and  still  more  markedly 
during  the  last  quarter  of  a  century. 

The  formation  of  the  American  Baptist  Educa- 
tion Society,  in  1888,  was  an  epoch-making  event 
in  our  educational  life.     When  this  pastorate  be- 


252    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

gan,  the  total  amount  of  property  and  endowment 
belonging  to  our  colleges  and  theological  seminaries 
was  not  more  than  three  milhon  five  hundred  thou- 
sand dollars  ;  to-day  it  is  not  less  than  thirty-six 
million  five  hundred  thousand  dollars.  The  Uni- 
versity of  Chicago,  promises  to  be  one  of  the  great- 
est, if  not  the  greatest,  educational  institution  in 
America.  It  is  under  Baptist  control,  one  of  its 
fundamental  laws  being  that  two-thirds  of  its  Board 
of  Trustees  must  always  be  members  of  Baptist 
churches.  It  is  at  the  same  time  the  broadest, 
most  liberal,  and  most  catholic  institution  of  learn- 
ing on  this  continent  The  result  has  vindicated 
the  wisdom  of  those  who  founded  our  Education 
Society  ;  its  work  is  one  of  the  noblest  achieve- 
ments in  our  histor)'.  It  aids  worthy  schools  of 
learning,  establishes  new  schools  where  they  are 
needed,  awakens  the  desire  for  the  highest  possible 
education,  and  places  constantly  before  our  young 
men,  and  especially  our  ministers,  the  highest 
standards  of  attainment. 

Baptists  ought  to  be  leaders  in  every  noble  edu- 
cational movement.  We  are  not  hampered  by 
effete  creeds  ;  we  are  not  anchored  to  mediaeval 
sentiments  ;  we  are  not  enslaved  to  hoary  tradi- 
tionalism. We  believe  that  the  nineteenth  century 
is  as  able  to  do  its  own  thinking  as  any  century  in 
the  history  of  the  Christian  church.  We  are  dis- 
ciples of  truth  from  whatever  quarter  it  comes  and 
by  whatsoever  messenger  it  is  brought.  We  fear 
no  scientific  discoveries,  if  only  they  bring  us  ad- 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  253 

ditional  truth.  We  regard  many  of  the  creeds  of 
the  churches  as  unsightly  scaffolds  standing  around 
the  temple  of  truth.  We  believe  that  when  these 
creeds  fall,  the  symmetry,  splendor,  and  glory  of 
the  temple  will  be  the  more  conspicuous. 

We  have  ever  been  the  advocates  of  soul-liberty 
in  its  largest  and  divinest  privileges  and  applica- 
tions. In  this  spirit  we  have  moved  forward  in  the 
founding  of  schools  and  colleges.  Brown  Univer- 
sity was  our  earliest  institution  of  higher  learning, 
being  founded  in  1764.  In  the  ten  years  from 
1874  to  1884,  we  founded  twenty-nine  institutions  ; 
from  1889  to  1894,  sixty-two.  Our  educational 
work  is  thus  gathering  force  and  moving  on  with 
vigor  from  year  to  year. 

The  founding  of  the  University  of  Chicago  is 
certainly  one  of  the  three  greatest  events  in  our 
history  as  a  people.  The  story  reads  like  a  fairy 
tale.  The  dream  of  1890  has  become  the  tran- 
scendent reality  of  1895.  Here  is  a  university  but 
four  years  old,  but  with  one  hundred  members  on 
its  faculty  selected  from  the  most  famous  colleges 
in  Europe  and  America,  and  with  more  than  one 
thousand  students  on  its  rolls.^  Its  doors  are  never 
closed  ;  its  work  goes  on  in  summer  as  in  winter. 
It  stands  in  close  affiliation  with  other  colleges  and 
professional   schools.      It   has    already   lifted    the 

1  In  1897,  according  to  the  "Baptist  Year-Book,"  this  institu- 
tion had  180  instructors ;  2,315  students  in  all  departments ; 
amount  of  property,  including  endowments,  ^8,625,000;  and 
215,000  volumes  in  the  library  [Ed.]. 


2  54    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

cause  of  higher  education  in  evety  other  institution 
of  learning  in  the  land.  It  has  raised  the  salaries 
of  professors  literally  all  over  the  world  ;  it  has 
done  more  than  any  other  one  institution  in  the 
world  to  give  appropriate  pecuniary  recognition  to 
the  profession  of  teaching.  It  is  located  in  a  city 
which  is  the  commercial  capital  of  a  vast  empire. 
It  has  already  given  an  enormously  powerful  im- 
pulse to  higher  education,  and  what  its  future  will 
be  neither  man  nor  angel  can  fully  foresee.  Its 
honored  founder  has  made  his  name  immortal 
Great  institutions  of  learning  are  the  most  per- 
manent creations  of  man  in  the  world.  They  are 
more  enduring  than  anything  this  side  of  the  eter- 
nal throne.  It  is  conceivable  that  in  some  great 
political  cataclysm  the  British  throne  may  fall ;  but 
it  is  not  conceivable  that  any  human  disaster  can 
overthrow  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  They  will  stand 
in  all  the  years  to  come,  reflecting  in  a  common 
ray  the  mingled  lights  of  high  learning  and  holy 
religion. 

Other  Baptist  laymen  might  well  learn  lessons 
from  the  generosity  of  the  founder  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Chicago.  One  recently  died  leaving  at  least 
ten  millions  to  his  family,  and  leaving  but  ten  thou- 
sand to  all  causes  of  God  and  man.  Another  re- 
cently died  leaving  eight  millions  and  absolutely 
nothing  to  any  cause  of  God  or  man.  Such  men 
have  made  great  failures  in  their  acquisition  of 
wealth.  Such  men  are  not  prepared  to  die.  We 
are  learning  that  millionaires  have  a  great  mission 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  255 

in  life.  The  problem  of  the  railHonaire  has  practi- 
cally arisen  during  the  period  of  this  present  pas- 
torate. The  old  French  motto,  noblesse  oblige,  must 
have  its  application  to  the  possession  of  wealth. 
God  will  hold  men  responsible  for  their  disposition 
of  their  great  possessions.  A  wise  disposition  of 
money  requires  more  talent,  and  vastly  more  re- 
ligion, than  its  rapid  acquisition.  God  multiply 
millionaires  among  us,  if  only  he  shall  give  them 
the  spirit  of  consecration  to  the  cause  of  God  and 
man.  Such  consecration  takes  away  all  cause  of 
criticism  from  anarchists  and  socialists  ;  but  the 
hoarding  of  vast  wealth  gives  some  reason  for  the 
criticisms  of  anarchism  which  are  muttered  in  dif- 
ferent parts  of  our  country.  May  Baptists  and  all 
other  American  patriotic  Christians  move  forward 
with  large-hearted  liberality  and  with  true  Christian 
generosity  for  the  support  of  all  institutions  founded 
in  the  interest  of  higher  education,  American  patri- 
otism, and  a  true  Christianity. 

ESTABLISHMENT    IN    ALL    DEPARTMENTS. 

We  to-day  pray  that  God  may  establish  our  de- 
nominational work  in  all  its  departments.  We 
offer  this  prayer  in  no  narrow  or  sectarian  spirit. 
We  believe  that  we  stand  for  certain  truths  of 
Scripture  either  entirely  neglected,  or  inadequately 
taught,  by  other  denominations  of  Christians.  We 
hold  that  no  distinct  denomination  has  a  right 
to  exist  except  it  teach  distinctive  truths.  No 
church  ought  to  be  maintained  simply  out  of  re- 


256    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

spect  to  a  tradition^  however  honorable  or  vener- 
able. Many  denominations,  were  this  principle 
practically  applied,  would  at  once  merge  into  other 
denominations  ;  but  we  stand  for  great  principles 
and  distinctive  truths.  In  all  the  ages  of  church 
history  we  have  stood  for  the  supremacy  of  the 
word  of  God  as  the  authoritative  rule  of  faith  and 
practice  ;  we  have  stood  for  a  regenerate  church- 
membership  ;  we  have  stood  for  soul-liberty  in  the 
interpretation  of  the  word  of  God  and  in  the  rela- 
tion of  men  to  the  State  ;  that  is  to  say,  we  have 
stood  for  the  entire  separation  of  Church  and  State  ; 
and  we  have  stood  also  for  the  integrity  of  the  or- 
dinances as  given  by  Christ  and  his  apostles. 

Our  Baptist  fathers  witnessed  to  these  truths  on 
the  rack  and  at  the  stake.  We  have  given  many 
of  our  noblest  souls  as  martyrs  to  the  cause  of  civil 
and  religious  liberty.  We  have  stained  the  snows 
on  Alpine  peaks,  and  we  have  enriched  the  soil  in 
Alpine  valleys  with  Baptist  blood.  Our  martyrs 
have  given  their  testimonies  by  giving  their  lives  in 
Old  England  and  by  many  forms  of  suffering  in 
New  England.  They  have  been  imprisoned  in 
Virginia  and  in  other  States,  and  evermore  the  blood 
of  the  martyrs  has  been  the  seed  of  the  church. 
It  was  not  uncommon  in  Virginia  that  when  Bap- 
tists were  observing  the  ordinance  of  baptism,  ef- 
forts were  made  not  only  to  throw  ridicule  on  the 
divine  ordinance,  but  to  attempt  to  drown  those 
who  were  thus  obedient  to  Christ.  We  do  not  for- 
get the  brave  Ireland  and  the  Culpeper  jail.      His 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  25/ 

preaching  through  the  bars  of  that  jail  resulted  in 
the  conversion  of  many  souls ;  and  when  the  jail 
was  torn  down  a  Baptist  church  was  erected  on  its 
ruins. 

About  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago,  fourteen 
persons  were  arrested  in  Saybrook,  Conn.,  simply 
for  holding  a  Baptist  meeting  ;  they  were  tried, 
fined,  and  hurried  on  foot  to  New  London,  twenty- 
five  miles  away.  There  they  were  cast  into  prison 
and  suffered  many  other  indignities.  About  the 
same  time  Elisha  Paine  was  arrested,  tried,  and  im- 
prisoned for  preaching  Baptist  doctrine  in  the  little 
village  of  Canterbury,  Conn.  But  he  preached 
behind  prison  bars  so  that  his  captives  were  glad 
to  release  him.  Two  young  men,  members  of  the 
Baptist  church  in  Canterbury,  were  students  in 
Yale  College.  While  at  home  on  their  vacation 
they  naturally  attended  their  own  church.  For  this 
offense  they  were  summoned  before  the  college 
authorities  on  returning,  and  were  reminded  that 
the  business  of  Yale  College  was  not  to  educate 
persons  whose  principles  and  practices  were  sub- 
versive of  the  visible  church  of  Christ.  The  of- 
ficers and  tutors  of  the  college,  according  to  the 
records,  November  19,  1734,  adjudged  that  these 
young  men,  Ebenezer  and  John  Cleaveland,  had 
acted  contrary  to  the  rules  of  the  gospel  and  the 
laws  of  the  colony  and  the  college,  in  attending 
services  in  the  Baptist  church,  and  that  they  shall 
be  publicly  admonished  for  their  fault,  and  if  they 
should  refuse  to  make  acknowledgment  they  shall 


258    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

be  expelled    from   the  college.     They  refused  to 
make  acknowledgment  and  were  expelled. 

We  do  not  forget  the  persecutions  endured  by 
John  Clark,  Obadiah  Holmes,  and  James  Crandall 
because  of  their  advocacy  of  the  doctrine  of  relig- 
ious libert}'  and  their  persistent  denial  of  infant 
baptism  as  scriptural.  When  Clark  stood  at  the 
whipping-post,  having  refused  to  pay  his  fine  of 
twent)-  pounds,  we  are  told  that  some  kind-hearted 
person  interfered  and  bought  his  release  with  a  sum 
of  money ;  also  the  fine  of  five  pounds  was  paid 
for  James  Crandall,  and  he  was  set  free ;  but 
Obadiah  Holmes,  a  man  of  broad  learning  and  in- 
vincible will,  upon  refusal  to  pay  his  fine  of  thirty' 
pounds,  was  so  cruelly  whipped  that  for  weeks  he 
was  unable  to  have  rest  in  his  bed  except  upon  his 
knees  and  elbows.  So  our  fathers  suffered  for  the 
sake  of  the  truth  as  it  is  in  Jesus. 

The  growth  of  the  Calvar>'-  Church  has  been 
marked  during  the  period  of  the  present  pastorate. 
The  number  of  members  t\vent}--five  years  ago  to 
day  was  t\vo  hundred  and  fort}--three  ;  the  number 
to-day  is  two  thousand  and  fort\--nine.  During 
that  period  three  thousand  two  hundred  and  sev- 
ent}'-four  have  been  received  into  the  fellowship 
of  the  church.  The  population  of  New  York 
twenty-five  years  ago  was  nearly  one  million.  The 
number  of  members  in  our  Baptist  churches  in  this 
cit}',  at  that  date,  was  eleven  thousand  five  hundred 
and  eight\'-nine  ;  the  population  to-day  is,  accord- 
ing to  the  latest  census,   about  one  million  eight 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  259 

hundred  thousand  ;  the  number  of  members  in 
Baptist  churches  in  the  city  now,  is  eighteen  thou- 
sand six  hundred  and  eight.  It  will  thus  be  seen 
that,  notwithstanding  the  fact  that  we  have  almost 
no  growth  from  immigration,  as  do  Romanists, 
Lutherans,  Episcopalians,  and  Presbyterians,  and 
notwithstanding  the  very  large  emigration  from  the 
city  to  Brooklyn  and  other  places  in  the  vicinity, 
we  have  about  kept  pace  with  the  growth  of  our 
rapidly  growing  city.  When  this  pastorate  was 
begun  twenty-five  years  ago  the  population  of  the 
United  States  was  about  thirty-eight  millions  ;  the 
number  of  Baptists  at  that  time  was  about  one 
million  five  hundred  thousand.  The  population  of 
the  country  to-day  (1895)  is  perhaps  sixty-seven 
millions ;  but  the  total  membership  in  Baptist 
churches  to-day,  not  including  seven  or  eight 
bodies  that  are  Baptists,  but  not  in  full  fellowship 
with  us,  is  three  million  six  hundred  thirty-seven 
thousand  four  hundred  and  twenty-one.  The  popu- 
lation of  the  United  States  will  not  double  probably 
for  ten  years  more,  but  the  number  of  Baptists 
has  increased  more  than  two  and  a  half  times  dur- 
ing this  period. 

It  is  thus  seen  that  we  are  growing  more  rapidly 
than  is  the  population  of  the  country,  notwith- 
standing the  tidal  waves  of  immigration  that  have 
rolled  into  it  during  these  last  twenty-five  years. 
During  the  last  twenty  years — not  to  go  so  far  back 
as  twenty-five — the  number  of  Regular  Baptist 
churches  has  increased  from  twenty  thousand  four 


26o    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

hundred  and  fifty-eight  to  thirty-seven  thousand 
nine  hundred  and  ten.  The  number  of  baptisms 
reported  in  the  last  "Year-Book"  (1895)  is  tvvo 
hundred  and  five  thousand  eight  hundred  and  fifty- 
seven  as  against  one  hundred  and  sevent}'-six  thou- 
sand and  seventy-seven  for  the  previous  year.  This 
is  the  largest  number  of  baptisms,  by  an  enormous 
margin,  ever  reported  by  us  in  a  single  year  ;  the 
number  of  ministers  has  increased  from  t\velve 
thousand  five  hundred  and  thirty  to  twent}-'-seven 
thousand  and  ninet\--one.  We  have  thus  more  than 
doubled  the  number  of  ministers  during  the  last 
twenty  years.  If  we  were  to  add  the  statistics  of 
other  Baptist  bodies  not  affiliated  with  us,  the  gains 
would  be  still  larger.  If  we  go  back  for  a  century 
or  more  we  shall  find  that  in  1784  there  was  one 
Baptist  to  ninety-four  of  the  population  ;  in  1812, 
one  to  fort>'-two  ;  in  1840,  one  to  thirt}- ;  in  i860, 
one  to  thirty-one;  in  1880,  one  to  twent}'-three  ; 
and  in  1890,  one  to  twenty-one. 

Some  of  these  facts  may  be  summed  up  so  as  to 
give  a  better  picture  for  the  actual  condition  of  our 
churches  and  of  their  relative  growth.  We  have  a 
larger  Baptist  membership  in  the  United  States  by 
one  million  twent)'-two  thousand  two  hundred  and 
seven  than  we  had  ten  years  ago.  There  has  thus 
been  a  net  gain  of  more  than  one  hundred  and  two 
thousand  each  year  for  the  last  ten  years  ;  we  also 
have  ten  thousand  two  hundred  and  nine  more 
churches  than  we  had  ten  years  ago  ;  this  is  a  gain 
of  more  than  one   thousand   churches  each  year. 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  26 1 

We  have  eight  thousand  and  twenty-seven  more 
ordained  ministers  than  we  had  ten  years  ago ;  this 
is  an  increase  of  over  eight  hundred  a  year.  Now 
and  then  a  pastor  of  a  Baptist  church  leaves  our 
denomination  for  some  other  body ;  but  we  have 
averaged  an  addition  of  more  than  two  to  our  min- 
isterial force  every  day  during  the  last  ten  years. 
If  we  except  the  Romanists  it  will  be  found  that 
one-fifth  of  all  the  church-members  in  the  United 
States  are  Baptists.  More  than  one-sixth  of  all  the 
Sunday-schools  are  under  our  denominational  care, 
and  more  than  one-seventh  of  all  the  Sunday- 
school  scholars  in  the  United  States  are  in  Baptist 
Sunday-schools.  God  has  wonderfully  blessed  our 
work  in  all  these  respects  during  the  last  twenty- 
five  years,  and  especially  during  the  last  ten  years. 
We  are,  in  all  our  interpretations  of  Scripture 
and  in  all  our  creedal  relations,  in  the  most  perfect 
sympathy  with  the  advanced  thought  of  the  hour. 
We  may  safely  predict  an  increase  of  ten  thousand 
Baptist  ministers  during  the  next  ten  years,  and 
also  of  at  least  ten  thousand  new  churches.  In  no 
spirit  of  boastfulness,  but  with  profound  gratitude 
to  God  for  his  manifold  blessings  in  all  these  re- 
spects, are  these  wonderful  facts  given.  There  are 
some  financial  facts  to  which  attention  ought  to  be 
called  and  which  are  equally  encouraging.  The 
value  of  our  church  property  is  now  eighty  million 
two  hundred  and  thirty-five  thousand  and  thirty- 
four  dollars.  In  1891,  we  organized  the  B.  Y.  P.  U. 
of  America.     This  movement  has  already  attained 


262    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

vast  proportions.  It  holds  annual  conventions 
of  great  size  and  of  corresponding  enthusiasm. 
But  the  Christian  Endeavor  Societies  in  Baptist 
churches  still  continue  their  organizations.  There 
is  no  opposition  between  the  two  bodies.  The 
Baptist  Congress  was  formed  in  1 892.  It  has  been 
commended  for  the  vigor  and  candor  of  its  discus- 
sions. The  trials  for  heresy  in  the  Episcopal  and 
Presbyterian  churches  show  the  value  of  our  Baptist 
polity.  The  nature  of  our  organization  makes  it 
impossible  that  we  should  have  a  great  and  dis- 
tracting trial  for  heresy  as  in  some  of  the  other 
denominations.  We  are  held  together  apparently 
by  the  loosest  of  bonds,  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  we 
are  bound  together  more  securely  and  have  vastly 
more  unity  in  opinion  and  practice  than  any  other 
denomination  in  America.  God  is  with  us  in 
wonderful  ways,  leading  us  forward  in  all  lines  of 
evangelical  work  and  rewarding  us  with  hopeful 
growth  because  of  loyalty  to  his  will  as  revealed  in 
his  word. 

There  are  marked  and  hopeful  drifts  among  us. 
Nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  we  have  a  larger, 
deeper,  higher,  and  wider  view  of  our  relations  to 
God  and  to  one  another  than  we  had  twenty-five 
years  ago.  We  hold  with  no  less  tenacity  to  the 
Scripture  as  the  only  authoritative  rule  of  faith  and 
practice.  We  stand  loyal  to  Jesus  Christ  as  the 
only  King  in  Zion.  We  recognize  no  bishop  but 
the  pastor  of  the  local  church  ;  no  priest  but  Jesus 
Christ  our  great  High-Priest,  and  the  priesthood  of 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  263 

all  true  Christians.  We  shall  continue  to  demand 
civil  and  religious  liberty ;  we  do  not  wish  to  waste 
time  in  controversy  with  brethren  of  other  names. 
We  are  determined  to  hold  the  truth  in  love  and 
to  manifest  it  with  charity.  Our  preaching  to-day 
is  not  so  theological  as  it  was  a  generation  ago,  but 
is  more  simple,  more  practical,  and  more  Christly. 
We  are  more  disposed  to  declare  the  love  than  to 
magnify  the  wrath  of  God.  There  are  fewer  revivals 
among  us  than  there  were  in  former  days  ;  but 
many  churches  are  never  without  the  spirit  of 
revival,  and  all  our  churches  have  larger  yearly 
additions  than  they  had,  taken  year  by  year,  during 
the  prevalence  of  great  and  sensational  revivals. 
We  believe  in  a  larger  liberty  than  we  did  a  gen- 
eration ago  in  the  form  of  services  in  our  churches. 
The  desire  on  the  part  of  many  is  for  a  richer,  more 
ornate,  more  worshipful,  and  more  scriptural  serv- 
ice. The  people  have  a  right  to  participate  in  the 
public  worship  of  God's  house. 

We  are  leading  as  never  before  in  the  higher 
education  of  the  country,  having  given  during  the 
past  few  years  more  money  to  this  object  than  any 
other  denomination  in  America.  The  standard  of 
learning  in  our  theological  seminaries  is  vastly 
higher  than  it  was  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago. 
God  is  leading  us  as  a  people  to  the  high  places  of 
honor,  by  leading  us  into  lowly  forms  of  service. 
We  are  at  peace  among  ourselves  as  a  local  church 
and  as  a  great  denomination.  It  is  not  too  much 
to  say  that  more  than  one-sixth  of  the  entire  popu- 


264    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

lation  of  these  United  States  are  members  or  ad- 
herents of  Baptist  churches.  Both  the  Methodist 
and  the  Baptist  churches  of  America  to-day  stand 
associated  with  a  larger  proportion  of  the  total 
population  than  does  the  Roman  Church.  Our 
religious  press  and  publication  houses  have  made 
remarkable  progress  during  the  last  twenty-five 
years.  And  yet  as  a  people,  we  have  only  begun 
to  appreciate  our  great  possibilities.  The  following 
table  gives  in  a  summary  way  many  of  the  facts 
already  detailed,  and  some  additional  facts  which 
will  be  of  interest.  According  to  the  "Baptist 
Year-Book"  (1895),  just  published,  the  statistics  of 
denominational  progress  in  the  United  States  as 
indicated  by  figures  are  as  follows,  the  tables  for 
the  years  1894  and  1895  being  contrasted  :^ 


Associations 

1.530 

1,498 

Ordained  ministers  .    .    .   • 

27,091 

25,354 

Churches 

37,910 

38,122 

Baptisms 

205,857 

176,077 

Total  membership    .... 

3,637,421 

3,496,988 

Sunday-schools 

22,016 

20,838 

Pupils  in  Sunday-schools    . 

1,500,834 

1-430-933 

Value  of  church  property    . 

$80,285,034 

$78,605,769 

Contributions  to  missions    . 

$1,138,059 

$1,467,293 

Total  contributions  and  expenses  $1 1,672, 691 

$12,560,713 

1  The  figures  for  1897,  according  to  the  "Year- Book,"  are  as  fol- 
lows :  Associations,  1,551  ;  ordained  ministers,  27,774  ;  churches, 
40,064;  baptisms,  176,058;  total  membership,  3,720,235;  Sun- 
day-schools, 23,302;  pupils  in  Sunday-schools,  1,779,886;  value 
of  church  property,  $81,648,246;  contributions  to  missions,  $1,- 
172,909.42;  total  contributions  and  expenses,  $11,755,118.58. 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  265 

The  facts  already  stated  have  an  interesting  re- 
lation to  the  growth  of  American  Protestantism  as  a 
whole.  The  period  since  1850  has  been  one  of 
severe  strain  upon  our  evangelical  churches,  because 
of  the  great  activity  of  rationalism,  materialism,  and 
spiritism,  and  especially  because  of  our  large  and 
often  undesirable  immigration.  The  statistics  quoted 
by  Dr.  Daniel  Dorchester,  in  the  last  edition  of 
his  "Religious  Progress,"  show  that  the  evangelical 
churches  have  more  than  kept  pace  with  the  growth 
of  the  population,  even  during  this  period. 

In  the  thirty  years  under  consideration,  the  whole  popula- 
tion increased  one  hundred  and  seventy  per  cent.,  but  the 
communicants  of  these  churches  increased  two  hundred  and 
ninety  per  cent,  or  a  half  faster  than  the  population.  And 
during  the  severe  strain  from  1870  to  1890,  while  the  popu- 
lation increased  sixty-two  per  cent,  the  communicants  in- 
creased one  hundred  and  seven  per  cent  The  total  increase 
of  communicants  from  1850  to  1880  was  six  million  five  hun- 
dred and  thirty-five  thousand  nine  hundred  and  eighty-five, 
or  more  than  twice  as  large  as  the  increase  in  the  fifty  years 
from  1800  to  1850.  It  has  usually  been  estimated  that  at 
the  close  of  the  third  century  the  number  of  Christians  in 
the  world  was  five  millions.  In  the  United  States  the  in- 
crease in  thirty  years  was  greater  than  the  total  increase  in 
the  first  three  centuries  of  the  Christian  era,  and  the  figures 
appear  to  show  that  the  growth  of  evangelical  Christianity 
in  this  country  in  ninety  years  exceeded  the  growth  of  Chris- 
tianity in  the  first  eight  centuries  after  Christ  by  an  excess 
of  more  than  eighteen  millions. 

THE    ESTABLISHMENT    OF    SPIRITUAL    WORK. 

We  pray  God  to  establish  our  distinctively  spir- 
itual work  in  our  own  church,  our  denomination, 


266    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and  our  beloved  country.  No  church  is  truly 
prosperous  except  God  be  using  it  in  the  conver- 
sion of  individuals  and  in  the  edification  of  saints. 
Its  pews  may  be  filled  with  people  and  its  treasury 
with  money,  but  it  is  not  really  a  prosperous  church 
of  Christ  unless  it  is  the  means  in  God's  hands  of 
winning  men  to  Christ.  This  church  has  never 
been  the  church  of  the  rich  exclusively  ;  nor  of  the 
poor  exclusively ;  it  has  aimed  to  be  the  church  of 
the  rich  and  poor.  It  has  never  been  a  revival 
church  in  the  technical  sense  of  that  term  ;  but  it 
has  ever  striven  to  be  a  "vival"  church.  It  has 
constantly  striven  for  the  conversion  and  edification 
of  men  and  women,  the  two  processes  going  on 
side  by  side.  Nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  a 
great  change  has  come  over  the  spirit  of  the  world 
within  the  last  twenty  years  in  its  relation  to  relig- 
ious truth.  A  quarter  of  a  century  ago  it  seemed 
as  if  materialism,  what  Carlyle  roughly  called  "a 
gospel  of  dirt,"  was  to  dominate  every  department 
of  scientific  thought.  That  day,  however,  has 
passed  away,  and  it  is  not  likely  to  return.  There 
is  now  a  markedly  changed  attitude  on  the  part  of 
scientific  men  toward  Christianity.  They  are  mani- 
festing a  spirit  of  reverence  toward  religious  truth 
entirely  unknown  a  generation  ago.  They  may 
not  have  adopted  the  old  dogmatic  statements  of 
Christian  experience  and  Bible  doctrine  ;  but  they 
certainly  have  a  deeper  perception  of  the  relations 
of  men  to  God  and  to  one  another  than  was  for- 
merly the  case. 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  26/ 

Two  books  have  recently  been  published  which 
illustrate  the  tendency  of  which  we  are  speaking  ; 
the  first  is  that  by  Benjamin  Kidd.  This  striking 
book  is  widely  read  and  earnestly  discussed  ;  it 
shows  the  changed  attitude  which  many  scientific 
men  now  maintain  toward  religious  questions. 
Doubtless  there  are  still  scientific  men  who  mani- 
fest a  spirit  of  arrogant  agnosticism,  but  the  num- 
ber is  very  much  smaller  than  it  was  three  decades 
ago.  The  other  book  is  by  the  Right  Hon.  Arthur 
J.  Balfour,  and  is  entitled  "The  Foundations  of 
Belief"  This  is  in  many  respects  a  remarkable 
book.  It  is  true  that  Professor  Fairbairn  has  se- 
verely criticised  some  of  its  features,  but  neverthe- 
less it  is  a  book  which  is  destined  to  exercise  a 
profound  influence  on  the  most  cultivated  minds  of 
our  generation.  There  is,  it  is  not  too  much  to  say, 
a  religious  revival  among  literary  men  and  scientists. 
There  is  now  no  occasion  for  Christian  people  even 
to  seem  to  be  panic-stricken,  as  many  were  a  gener- 
ation ago.  Agnosticism  is  not  now  to  have  every- 
thing its  own  way.  When  this  pastorate  was  be- 
gun there  was  really  a  period  of  religious  depres- 
sion ;  it  was  a  time  when  the  intolerance  of  science 
was  a  thousand-fold  greater  than  were  ever  the  in- 
tolerance and  bigotry  of  religion.  It  was  then  al- 
most believed  that  no  man  of  practical  intelligence 
could  be  an  evangelical  Christian.  The  air  was 
filled  by  the  manufactured  thunder  of  scientific 
drums.  It  was  a  time  when  many  forms  of  science 
were  skeptical  so  far  as  the  deepest  experiences  of 


268    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

the  heart  and  the  highest  possibiHties  of  the  im- 
mortal life  were  concerned. 

Now,  however,  as  has  already  been  suggested, 
the  tendency  of  the  best  modern  thought  is  toward 
Christian  theism.  Mr.  Balfour's  great  intellectual 
power  places  him  in  the  first  rank  of  British  states- 
men. In  his  interest  in  religious  discussions  he  is 
the  true  successor  of  Gladstone.  Doubtless  he  is 
himself  destined  for  the  premiership.  These  are 
stirring  words  of  his  which  he  writes  from  a  purely 
philosophical  point  of  view  : 

What  is  needed  is  such  a  living  faith  in  God's  relation- 
ship to  man  as  shall  leave  no  place  for  that  helpless  resent- 
ment against  the  appointed  order  so  apt  to  rise  within  us  at 
the  sight  of  undeserved  pain.  And  this  faith  is  possessed 
by  those  who  vividly  realize  the  Christian  form  of  theism. 
.  .  .  Among  the  needs  ministered  to  by  Christianity  are 
some  which  increase  rather  than  diminish  with  the  growth 
of  knowledge  and  the  progress  of  science  ;  this  religion  is 
therefore  no  mere  reform,  appropriate  only  to  a  vanished 
epoch  in  the  history  of  culture  and  civilization,  but  a  devel- 
opment of  theism  now  more  necessary  to  us  than  ever. 

He  frankly  asserts  his  belief  that  there  is  better 
evidence  for  the  existence  of  God  than  there  is  for 
the  material  world  in  which  we  are  placed.  The 
whole  book  is  a  longing  and  loving  search  for  the 
living  God  who  controls  the  affairs  of  men.  He 
affirms  that  there  is  no  ground  for  quarrel  between 
theology  and  science,  but  that  science  itself  presup- 
poses the  existence  of  God,  and  that  without  this  in- 
dispensable hypothesis  we  can  understand  nothing  of 


ESTABLISHING    OUR    WORK  269 

science.  It  is.  a  most  hopeful  sign  when  a  man  of 
his  political  position,  intellectual  ability,  and  brilliant 
social  and  political  prospects  writes  such  a  volume 
as  this.  If  he  lives,  he  is  likely  to  be  as  conspicu- 
ous a  figure  in  English  histoiy  as  the  great  Glad- 
stone. He  is  beyond  question  the  ablest  parlia- 
mentary leader  in  the  House  of  Commons.  In  one 
political  party  he  is  idolized,  and  in  the  other  he  is 
respected  alike  for  character  and  ability.  This 
brilliant  debater,  able  politician,  and  successful  ad- 
ministrator now  appears  as  a  thoughtful  essayist 
and  a  religious  teacher.  In  this  volume  he  unites 
judicial  serenity  with  dashing  humor,  and  earnest 
faith  with  equally  earnest  inquiry.  He  illumines 
the  dreary  wilderness  of  metaphysics  with  the  sun- 
shine of  genius  and  the  calm  light  of  faith.  The 
pendulum  has  begun  to  swing  back  to  the  Bible, 
to  faith,  to  Christ.  Already  the  music  of  the  open- 
ing century  falls  upon  our  ears  ;  it  is  sweet  music. 
Atheism,  materialism,  agnosticism,  and  other  de- 
structive forms  of  error  of  an  earlier  day,  have 
proved  utterly  weak  and  worthless.  Once  more 
Christ  has  ascended  his  throne,  and  truth  is  comin^ 
down  from  its  cross.  The  music  of  the  comingr 
years  is  tender  with  love,  bright  with  hope,  and 
divine  with  trustful  faith. 

No  words  of  mine  can  express  the  tenderness  I 
feel  toward  the  noble  men  and  women  who  have 
gone  from  this  church  militant  to  the  church  tri- 
umphant. Their  memory  is  a  precious  legacy  to 
this  church  of  Christ.     Their  names  will  live  in  our 


270    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

hearts  so  long  as  these  hearts  continue  to  beat. 
Neither  can  any  words  of  mine  adequately  describe 
the  tender  regard  cherished  for  many  still  among 
the  living.  We  have  worked  together  amid  joy 
and  sorrow.  Our  prayers,  our  tears,  and  our  songs 
have  been  united  in  common  experiences  of  trial 
and  triumph.  We  have  striven  to  honor  Jesus 
Christ  in  our  work  as  members  of  the  Calvary 
Church.  We  have  sought  to  bring  men  into  lov- 
ing obedience  to  him  as  Prophet,  Priest,  and  King. 
We  have  nothing  whereof  to  boast ;  we  have  every- 
thing for  which  to  be  grateful  to  the  loving  kind- 
ness and  tender  mercy  of  our  Father  in  heaven. 

We  now  look  thankfully  to  the  past,  and  hopefully 
to  the  future.  God  alone  knows  what  is  before  us 
in  our  personal,  family,  and  church  life.  We  know 
that  he  will  never  leave  nor  forsake  us,  and  that 
whether  our  years  be  many  or  few,  we  shall  con- 
tinue to  enjoy  his  presence  and  blessing,  and  when 
life  shall  cease  we  shall  cast  our  crowns  at  his  feet, 
and  rejoice  in  his  completed  salvation  throughout 
eternity.  Our  best  work  may  never  be  fully  estab- 
lished here.  God  grant  that  it  may  be  such  work 
that  we  shall  be  willing  to  meet  it  at  the  judgment- 
seat  of  Christ.  May  each  one  of  us  hear  him  say 
at  the  last :  "  Well  done,  thou  good  and  faithful  serv- 
ant, thou  hast  been  faithful  over  a  few  things,  I 
will  make  thee  ruler  over  many  things  ;  enter  thou 
into  the  joy  of  thy  Lord." 


XI 

THE  ORGANIZATION  OF  A  CHURCH^ 

THE  ability  to  organize  a  church  for  effective 
work  is  as  rare  as  it  is  important.  Like  all 
Christian  graces,  however,  this  ability  may  be  ac- 
quired to  a  greater  or  less  degree.  It  is  vastly  im- 
portant for  the  young  pastor  fully  to  appreciate  its 
worth  and  earnestly  to  strive  for  its  possession. 
The  success  of  many  pastors  is  largely  due  to  their 
ability  to  organize  and  to  inspire  their  people  for 
vigorously  aggressive  and  wisely  conservative  work. 
The  work  of  a  great  church  is,  in  an  important 
sense,  a  gigantic  business  enterprise  ;  sanctified 
business  methods  are  absolutely  necessary. 

The  great  need  to-day  in  political  and  mercantile 
organizations,  as  well  as  in  the  church  of  God,  is 
inspiring  leaders.  Thousands  are  ready  to  follow 
wherever  a  wise  and  courageous  man  may  lead  the 
way.    Much  of  the  power  of  organization  necessaiy 

^  The  substance  of  this  and  the  two  following  papers  has  been 
given  in  familiar  addresses  in  several  Baptist  theological  seminaries. 
Many  references  then  made  in  the  comparative  privacy  of  the  class- 
room are  now  necessarily  omitted.  To  address  ministerial  students 
on  the  general  topic  considered  was  felt  to  be  a  delicate  and  diffi- 
cult task  ;  the  same  feeling  exists,  and  in  a  greater  degree,  in  at- 
tempting to  put  the  oral  suggestions  into  printed  form.  The  aim 
will  still  be  especially  to  address  the  students  in  the  theological 
seminaries  and  the  younger  brethren  in  the  pastorate. 

271 


2/2    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

to  a  man  who  is  at  the  head  of  a  great  mercantile 
house,  or  to  a  successful  leader  of  men  in  political 
life,  or  to  the  president  of  a  great  railroad,  is  neces- 
sary to  effective  leadership  in  the  church  of  God. 
The  men  who  can  thus  lead  are  men  of  genius. 
God's  greatest  work  is  not  carried  on  by  simple- 
tons. Paul,  Augustine,  and  Calvin  would  have 
been  men  of  great  mark  in  any  walk  of  life.  Lu- 
ther, Wesley,  and  Whitfield  were  kings  even  among 
the  kingly  men  of  the  earth.  Listening  senates 
and  admiring  thousands  would  have  been  held  by 
the  spell  of  their  entrancing  eloquence  and  led  by 
their  rare  sagacity  had  they  given  themselves  up  to 
political  leadership.  We  have  elsewhere  empha- 
sized the  thought  that  Mr.  Spurgeon  might  be 
Prime  Minister  of  England,  in  another  sense  than 
that  in  which  he  is  "the  prime  minister"  to-day, 
had  he  given  his  attention  to  political  life.  Men 
who  are  wise  in  winning  souls  are  men  who  would 
bring  things  to  pass  mightily  in  any  department  of 
life's  endeavor.  In  religious  as  in  secular  work,  a 
chief  element  of  any  man's  success  is  his  ability 
wisely  to  organize  the  forces  at  his  command. 

I.  In  emphasizing  the  importance  of  wisely  or- 
ganizing a  church,  it  is  to  be  remarked  that  every 
young  pastor  should  see  that  his  Board  of  Trustees 
is  legally  elected.  Gentlemen  of  legal  attainments, 
who  have  given  some  attention  to  the  subject,  in- 
form the  writer  that  there  are  scores  of  churches  in 
the  State  of  New  York,  not  to  speak  of  other 
States,  whose  trustees  have  never  been  elected  ac- 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  2/3 

cording  to  the  forms  of  law.  Such  trustees,  strictly 
speaking,  are  not  able  either  to  buy,  hold,  or  sell 
church  property.  Every  piece  of  property  under 
their  control  is  liable  to  be  lost  to  the  church  and 
to  the  denomination.  This  is  certainly  a  very  seri- 
ous state  of  affairs ;  and  it  is  certainly  worthy  of  the 
most  careful  examination.  Too  much  property 
bought  by  denominational  money  has  been  already 
squandered. 

It  may  be  said  that  it  is  not  the  pastor's  business 
to  look  after  the  secular  affairs  of  the  church.  But 
it  will  be  admitted  that  in  some  churches  there  is 
no  one  else  qualified  to  look  after  these  interests. 
When  there  are  men  so  qualified  the  wise  pastor 
will  neither  wish  nor  need  to  care  for  secular  mat- 
ters. The  true  pastor  cannot  be  indifferent  to  any 
interests  of  the  church  over  which  God  has  placed 
him.  He  dare  not  run  the  risk  of  seeing  his 
people's  money  diverted  from  the  purpose  for 
which  it  was  contributed  ;  such  neglect  upon  his 
part  would  be  little  less  than  criminal.  What  shall 
he  do  in  order  to  serve  these  interests  ?  Let  him 
ascertain  under  what  law  his  church  is  organized, 
and  especially  what  are  the  requirements  of  that 
law  as  relating  to  the  election  of  trustees.  If  there 
is  a  competent  lawyer  in  the  church  or  congrega- 
tion, his  services  ought  to  be  secured.  Often  the 
work  which  a  lawyer  may  do  in  this  way  will 
prove  to  be  a  blessing  to  his  soul,  if  he  is  a  Chris- 
tian ;  and  if  he  is  not  a  Christian  it  may  be  one  of 
the  means  of  awakening  him  to  his  duty  toward 


274    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Christ.  The  result  of  such  an  examination  will 
show  that  in  some  States  there  are  several  laws  ac- 
cording to  any  one  of  which  the  church,  in  its  legal 
relations,  has  been  organized.  To  discover  that 
point  is  the  chief  end  of  the  inquiry.  The  legal 
relations  which  the  church  sustains  cannot  be  over- 
looked ;  for  while  a  church  is  a  spiritual  body,  still, 
so  far  as  its  relations  to  property  are  concerned,  it 
has  its  legal  aspects. 

According  to  most  of  the  laws  under  which 
churches  are  organized,  trustees  are  entrusted  with 
much  power.  Their  control  over  the  property  is 
well-nigh  supreme.  They  can  buy  and  sell,  and 
they  can  make  great  changes  in  the  church  build- 
ing with  almost  absolute  authority.  It  is  easy  for 
pastors  and  religious  officers  in  a  church  to  come 
into  conflict  with  trustees,  and  such  a  conflict  is  as 
hurtful  when  it  is  brought  about  as  it  is  easy  to 
bring  it  about.  Here  the  utmost  wisdom  must 
control.  Where  the  spirit  of  Christ  prevails  in  the 
church,  and  where  men  possessed  of  that  spirit  are 
on  the  Board  of  Trustees,  that  body  may  not  insist 
on  the  full  exercise  of  the  powers  which  the  law 
confers.  Under  some  laws  the  church  is  not  able 
to  appoint  extra  meetings,  to  light  fires,  or  to  con- 
sume gas  in  the  church  edifice  without  the  consent 
of  the  trustees,  should  they  insist  on  the  full  exer- 
cise of  their  authority.  It  would  be  a  remarkable 
Board  that  would  insist  on  its  rights  to  such  a  de- 
gree as  this  ;  but  there  are  remarkable  Boards. 

Shall  any  but  members  of  a  church  worshiping 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  2/5 

in  a  given  place  be  elected  as  trustees  ?  That 
question  has  often  been  asked.  According  to  the 
laws  under  which  some  churches  are  organized,  the 
body  electing  trustees  is  not  the  church,  strictly 
speaking,  but  those  known  as  corporators ;  this 
designation  includes  all  persons  of  full  age  who 
have  been  contributors  for  at  least  one  year  to  the 
support  of  the  gospel  in  that  church.  This  lan- 
guage is  sufficiently  vague  to  admit  of  misunder- 
standing. How  much  must  a  man  contribute,  or 
rather  how  little  may  he  contribute,  and  still  be 
qualified  to  vote?  Other  churches  are  so  organized 
that  none  but  their  own  members  can  be  trustees. 
We  do  not  here  insist  on  making  this  a  universal 
law.  There  are  often  excellent  men  in  a  congre- 
gation who  are  not  members  of  the  church,  but 
who  could  be  useful  to  an  unusual  degree  as  trus- 
tees. Electing  them  to  this  office  often  deepens 
their  interest  in  the  work  of  the  church,  and  in 
many  instances  has  led  them  to  accept  Christ  and 
to  join  the  church.  In  determining  this  matter 
much  must  depend  upon  the  character  of  the  men 
who  may  be  available  as  trustees  ;  no  rule  can  be 
laid  down  which  is  of  universal  application.  What 
we  insist  upon  is  that  the  law  under  which  the 
church  is  organized  should  be  known  to  the  pastor 
at  least,  and  that  in  the  election  of  trustees  it  should 
be  rigidly  observed.  Its  rigid  observance  will  apply 
to  reading  from  the  pulpit  the  proper  number  of 
times  and  at  the  right  dates  the  notice  of  a  call  for 
the  election  of  trustees,  and  the  clear  statement  of 


2/6    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

the  qualification  of  voters.  It  will  also  include  the 
methods  of  voting,  so  far  as  announcing  the  open- 
ing and  closing  of  the  polls,  and  all  matters  per- 
taining thereto,  are  concerned.  In  regard  to  every 
detail  the  law  should  be  observed  to  the  very 
letter.  Such  observance  will  protect  the  property, 
and  may  prevent  serious  church  quarrels.  We 
have  known  several  sad  church  difficulties  and 
painful  litigations  grow  out  of  irregularity  in  the 
election  of  trustees. 

Pastors  must  give  attention  to  this  matter.  Many 
are  sadly  ignorant  of  their  duty  in  this  fespect. 
Many  have  not  appreciated  its  importance.  Our 
theological  seminaries  have  failed  to  call  the  atten- 
tion of  their  students  to  matters  of  this  sort,  and 
young  men  are  left  to  stumble  along  as  best  they 
can  during  the  earlier  years  of  their  ministry'. 
Many  questions  touching  this  subject  are  often  put 
to  pastors  of  experience,  thus  showing  that  their 
younger  brethren  need  and  desire  information  on 
this  subject.  Some  thoroughly  well-informed  law- 
yer could  do  great  service  to  pastors  and  churches 
by  giving  a  paper  in  the  public  prints,  in  simple 
language,  free  from  unnecessary  legal  technicalities 
and  verbosity,  containing  a  full  statement  of  the 
rights  of  trustees,  the  laws  governing  their  election, 
and  other  matters  pertaining  to  the  subject.  Per- 
haps this  paper  may  be  the  channel  through  which 
such  information  may  be  given  to  many  of  our  stu- 
dents and  younger  pastors.  A  portion  of  this  book 
could  not  be  put  to  better  use. 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  2/7 

2.  The  election  of  deacons  next  claims  our  at- 
tention in  discussing  the  organization  of  a  church. 
In  the  organization  of  a  new  church,  their  election 
would  naturally  be  considered  before  the  election 
of  trustees  ;  but  where  young  men  are  called  to 
churches  already  existing  they  will,  of  course,  find 
deacons  already  in  office.  We  have  therefore 
placed  their  election  second  on  this  list.  The  suc- 
cess of  a  church  must  necessarily  depend  largely 
on  the  character  of  its  deacons  ;  they  should  be 
the  pastor's  most  affectionate  friends  and  efficient 
helpers.  We  ought  not  to  make  less  but  more  of 
this  office.  It  is  common,  in  some  quarters,  to 
speak  slightingly  of  deacons,  but  the  practice  is  as 
objectionable  as  it  is  common.  The  familiar  say- 
ing, still  attributed  to  Mr.  Spurgeon,  although  he 
has  taken  pains  to  deny  that  he  ever  uttered  it,  is 
grossly  unjust  to  the  average  deacon.  There  are 
unfortunately  bad  deacons  ;  and  there  are  unfor- 
tunately bad  pastors.  But  the  average  deacon  will, 
we  are  sure,  compare  favorably  in  his  office  with 
the  average  pastor  in  his  office.  The  office  of  dea- 
con is  to  be  honored.  If  we  exalt  our  conception 
of  the  office  we  shall  do  something  to  ennoble  the 
men  who  fill  it. 

With  the  history  of  the  election  of  the  first  dea- 
cons, as  given  in  the  New  Testament,  we  are  all 
somewhat  familiar.  "The  seven  men  of  honest 
report,  full  of  the  Holy  Ghost  and  wisdom,"  were 
selected  to  perform  service  in  earthly  things  for 
the   needy  members  of  the   church.     They  were 


2y^    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

not,  strictly  speaking,  religious  officers  ;  no  doubt 
many  of  their  duties,  in  the  early  history  of  the 
church,  included  some  of  those  now  performed  by 
trustees.  They  were  elected  to  give  the  apostles 
greater  freedom  from  care  regarding  temporal 
things,  that  they  might  "give  themselves  continu- 
ally to  prayer  and  the  ministry  of  the  word."  The 
deacons  were  not  an  order  in  the  ministry,  although 
some  of  their  number  were  successful  preachers. 
Their  special  duty  was  to  distribute  the  alms  of 
the  church. 

It  does  not  seem  necessary,  in  this  paper,  to  dis- 
cuss the  duties  to  be  performed  and  the  character 
to  be  possessed  by  deacons.  It  is  fair  to  assume 
that  the  majority  of  readers  are  sufficiently  familiar 
with  this  branch  of  the  general  subject,  the  infor- 
mation being  fully  given  in  the  New  Testament 
itself  Practical  questions,  however,  often  arise  and 
press  themselves  upon  the  attention  of  young  pas- 
tors. How  many  deacons  ought  a  church  to  have? 
At  its  organization  it  would  naturally  have  two  at 
least ;  for  every  additional  hundred  members,  it 
would  seem  fitting  that  there  should  be  an  addi- 
tional deacon  elected.  There  is  nothing  in  the 
New  Testament  which  would  limit  the  number  to 
seven,  although  as  is  well  known  that  was. a  sacred 
number  among  the  Hebrews;  but  this  number 
was  not  commanded  at  the  time  of  the  election 
of  the  first  deacons.  This  number  was  sufficiently 
large  to  secure  the  faithful  discharge  of  the  special 
duty  for  which  they  were  appointed.     There  is  no 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  279 

intimation  that  they  were  expected  to  preach ;  they 
were  not  an  "order  of  the  clergy." 

In  the  Jewish  synagogue,  men  were  set  apart  to 
care  for  the  poor,  and  that  office  in  the  synagogue 
probably  suggested  the  diaconate  in  the  church. 
Shall  they  be  elected  for  life  ?  This  is  a  fair  ques- 
tion. We  should  answer  it  in  the  affirmative,  as  a 
rule.  There  may,  however,  be  good  reasons  fof 
electing  deacons  for  a  limited  period.  Where  a 
church  is  situated  in  a  new  community  with  a  small 
membership,  and  with  no  one  thoroughly  fitted  for 
the  office,  and  every  prospect  of  soon  having  new 
men  who  would  be  fitted  for  that  office,  it  would 
seem  to  be  the  part  of  wisdom  to  elect  deacons  for 
a  brief  period,  say  for  three  years.  Trustees  are  so 
elected  ;  superintendents  are  elected  for  a  limited 
time,  and  sometimes,  unfortunately,  pastors  are  so 
elected.  Under  the  circumstances  named,  there 
can  be  no  valid  reasons  against  electing  deacons  for 
a  limited  period.  In  some  churches,  great  changes 
in  intellectual  culture,  in  social  standing,  and  in 
general  efficiency,  take  place  in  a  few  years  by  the 
introduction  of  new  members.  The  men  elected 
to  the  office  of  deacon  may  thus  become  manifestly 
unfit  for  the  position.  It  is  eminently  fitting  that 
this  change  of  circumstances  should  be  recognized 
and  the  worth  of  the  new  men  be  utilized.  If  the 
deacons  have  been  elected  under  a  time  limit, 
changes  can  be  made  without  giving  offense,  and 
greatly  to  the  advantage  of  all  the  interests  of  the 
church. 


280    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  duty  of  electing  young  men  to  this  honor- 
able office  is  earnestly  emphasized.  The  idea  that 
none  but  men  of  advanced  age  and  antiquated 
ideas  should  be  deacons  is  an  utter  mistake.  It  is 
not  a  question  of  age,  but  of  character,  efficiency, 
and  consecration.  There  were  in  John's  days 
young  men  who  were  strong ;  young  men  in  whom 
the  word  of  God  was  abiding ;  young  men  who  had 
overcome  the  wicked  one.  This  was  a  peerless  tri- 
umph ;  this  is  a  matchless  eulogy.  Put  by  the  side 
of  this  the  proudest  honors  of  earth  and  they  fade 
into  utter  insignificance.  Thank  God,  there  are  still, 
in  the  church  of  Christ,  }'oung  men  who  are  strong  ; 
young  men  in  whom  God's  word  abides  ;  young 
men  who  have  overcome  the  wicked  one  !  Though 
they  are  in  the  world,  they  are  not  of  the  world. 
They  are  girded  with  strength,  armed  with  the 
shield  of  faith,  the  girdle  of  truth,  and  the  breast- 
plate of  righteousness  ;  they  are  panoplied  with  the 
whole  armor  of  God.  There  are,  in  many  churches, 
young  men  with  unsullied  names  and  with  marked 
business  ability — men  who  walk  with  their  heads 
among  the  stars.  Such  young  men  should  be  rec- 
ognized ;  their  influence  over  other  young  men  in 
the  church  and  out  of  it  is  simply  immeasurable. 
We  need  the  young  men,  and  we  need  the  old 
men  ;  neither  class  should  be  opposed  to  the  other. 
The  church  has  room  for  the  enthusiasm,  hopeful- 
ness, and  enterprise  of  the  young,  as  well  as  for  the 
ripened  wisdom,  the  matured  experience,  and  mel- 
lowed beauty  of  the  old. 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  28 1 

Shall  deacons  be  ordained  ?  An  examination  of 
the  methods  employed  in  apostolic  churches  leads 
to  the  conclusion  that  deacons  ought  to  be  ordained. 
It  was  customary  once  in  some  of  our  Baptist 
churches  to  submit  all  who  were  received  into  the 
church  to  a  form  of  ordination.  When  members 
were  welcomed  at  the  communion  table,  it  was 
usual  for  some  pastors  to  lay  hands  on  the  head  of 
each  person.  We  know  that  it  was  common  in 
this  way  to  set  apart  those  who  were  appointed  to 
the  office  of  deacon.  This  act  was  not  supposed 
to  impart  any  special  power,  but  simply  to  indicate 
that  those  thus  set  apart  had  received  from  God  the 
necessary  qualifications  for  their  office.  The  seven 
deacons  who  were  elected  first  to  this  office,  though 
chosen  by  the  church,  yet  had  the  hands  of  the 
apostles  solemnly  laid  upon  them.  The  idea  is  to 
make  more  of  this  office,  and  not  less.  It  has  been 
honored  of  God  ;  it  should  be  honored  of  men. 

It  is  true  that  in  many  of  our  city  churches  dea- 
cons are  not  able  to  render  much  help  to  the  pastor. 
Where  they  live  at  long  distances  from  their  places 
of  business  it  is  impossible  for  them  to  give  much 
time  to  their  work  as  deacons.  Those  who  are 
earnestly  engaged  in  engrossing  forms  of  business 
cannot  give  much  time  and  thought  to  the  work 
of  the  church.  Those  who  have  a  little  more  lei- 
sure are  burdened  with  social  claims,  and  with  vari- 
ous forms  of  religious  work  upon  committees  in 
connection  with  our  denominational  societies.  It 
thus  comes  to  pass  that  in  the  hurried  life  of  our 


282    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

great  cities  but  little  direct  personal  work  can  be 
done  even  by  the  most  devoted  deacons.  But 
even  under  these  circumstances  there  is  still  for 
them  a  wide  sphere  of  usefulness  in  meetings  for 
prayer,  for  inquiry,  and  for  counsel.  Many  of  our 
most  experienced  pastors  give  it  as  their  deliberate 
conviction  that  they  have  never  had  warmer  friends 
nor  more  willing  helpers  than  they  have  found 
among  their  deacons.  The  office  honored  by 
apostolic  ordination,  honored  by  the  gratitude  of 
thousands  of  pastors,  and  honored  by  the  benedic- 
tion of  God,  is  not  to  be  lightly  esteemed  by  any 
pastor  or  any  member  of  the  church. 

3.  In  the  next  place,  the  importance  of  or- 
ganizing a  committee,  to  be  called  "  the  advisory 
committee,"  is  to  be  emphasized. 

In  some  churches  this  committee  is  called  "  the 
prudential  committee."  But  this  name  is  not  suf- 
ficiently specific  ;  and,  furthermore,  it  suggests  the 
necessity  of  a  certain  sort  of  espionage,  as  if  some 
one  were  determined  upon  doing  something  veiy 
imprudent.  There  can  be  no  better  name  than 
that  of  advisory  committee.  This  name  exactly 
indicates  its  character.  It  possesses  no  legislative 
power  ;  it  is  simply  the  instrument  of  the  church 
acting  along  lines  already  indicated  by  the  church, 
or  suggesting  lines  along  which  the  church  may  act. 
This  committee  may  well  be  composed  of  the  dea- 
cons and  the  clerk  ex  officio,  and  of  a  number  of 
brethren  who  are  in  course  of  training  to  become 
deacons.      It  oueht  also  to  have  in  its  number  some 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  283 

members  of  the  Board  of  Trustees.  They  will  be 
able  correctly  to  report  to  that  body  the  recom- 
mendations of  this  committee,  so  far  as  they  relate 
to  questions  affecting  the  secular  affairs  of  the 
church  ;  friction  will  thus  be  avoided,  and  harmony 
of  action  secured.  In  this  committee  there  ought 
to  be  representatives  of  all  classes  in  the  church. 
This  method  of  selection  would  give  every  division 
of  the  church,  as  to  social  position,  intellectual  cul- 
ture, and  spiritual  efficiency,  its  proper  representa- 
tion. This  is  sometimes  a  necessity,  in  order  to 
prevent  jealousy  and  to  avoid  friction.  It  has  been 
found  well  to  elect  members  for  a  period  of  three 
years,  the  office  of  a  certain  number  expiring  at 
the  end  of  each  year,  and  others  then  being  elected 
to  take  the  places  thus  made  vacant.  In  this  way 
there  is  always  an  opportunity  to  give  recognition 
to  new  and  efficient  members  who  come,  in  the 
meantime,  into  the  church.  This,  indeed,  is  one  of 
the  uses  of  this  committee.  It  gives  recognition 
and  appreciation  to  men  who  may  be  fitted  to 
occupy  positions  between  the  office  of  trustee  and 
deacon. 

This  committee  is  the  pastor's  cabinet,  his  body- 
guard, his  confidential  counselors.  The  pastor,  if 
a  wise  man,  will  apparently  do  nothing  of  himself; 
he  will  work  entirely  through  this  committee.  All 
new  business  which  is  brought  before  the  church 
ought  to  come  through  this  channel.  The  pastor 
will  then  be  relieved  of  much  responsibility  and 
saved  from  an  equal  amount  of  criticism.      If  he 


284    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

has  less  praise  he  will  have  still  less  blame.  He 
apparently  is  nothing  anywhere,  while  virtually  he 
may  be,  in  a  sense,  almost  everything  everywhere. 
If  he  has  from  ten  to  twenty  of  his  bravest,  most 
intelligent,  and  most  consecrated  brethren  stand 
about  him,  no  arrow  of  criticism  can  reach  him 
until  it  has  passed  through  them.  There  will  be 
times  in  the  history  of  any  church  when  this  con- 
sideration will  be  vastly  important  to  any  pastor. 
While  this  body  is  purely  advisory  its  advice  will 
have  great  moral  weight.  If  the  committee  is 
carefully  selected,  no  average  church  will  be  likely 
earnestly  to  oppose  its  unanimous  recommenda- 
tions ;  and  the  committee  ought  never  to  make  a 
recommendation  in  which  it  was  not  unanimous. 

These  recommendations,  therefore,  should  be 
especially  deliberate,  considerate,  and  Christian. 
The  sense  of  responsibility  in  making  recommenda- 
tions necessarily  produces  conservatism  in  coming 
to  conclusions.  All  matters  of  new  business,  the 
hearing  of  experiences,  the  receiving  and  granting 
of  letters,  and  especially  all  matters  of  discipline, 
must  first  come  before  this  committee,  and  through 
this  channel  be  introduced  into  the  church.  There 
are  many  cases  of  discipline  in  which  matters  of 
great  delicacy  require  prolonged,  patient,  and  con- 
fidential consideration.  There  are  times  when  such 
subjects  ought  not  for  a  moment  to  be  discussed 
in  all  their  details  before  any  mixed  assembly. 
Times  there  are  when  such  discussion  is  absolutely 
out  of  place  before  boys  and  girls,  who  form  a  con- 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  285 

siderable  part  of  the  membership  of  many  of  our 
churches.  Many  matters  of  discipHne  can  be 
wisely  settled  without  bringing  them  before  the 
church  for  general  discussion.  Scores  of  cases  are 
known  where  adjustments  have  been  made  and 
painful  alienations  reconciled  through  the  inter- 
vention of  this  committee,  while  all  publicity  was 
avoided.  The  introduction  of  these  subjects  in 
open  church  meetings  might  have  alienated  families, 
brought  great  reproach  upon  churches  and,  through 
the  newspapers,  scandal  upon  the  cause  of  Christ. 
One's  heart  is  sickened  at  the  thought  of  the  need- 
lessness  as  well  as  the  wickedness  of  the  average 
church  quarrel. 

All  matters  of  ordinary  business  should  be  ma- 
tured in  this  committee,  so  that  wise  recommenda- 
tions could  be  made  to  the  church  at  its  regular 
meeting.  Often  business  meetings  of  the  church 
destroy  the  sweetness  and  spirituality  of  many  of 
our  best  prayer  meetings.  When  subjects  are 
brought  into  the  ehurch  without  previously  matured 
deliberation,  general  discussions  arise,  and  often  ac- 
rimonious debates  ensue.  Sharp  words  are  spoken 
regarding  matters  of  very  little  importance  ;  matters 
so  trivial  that  in  themselves  they  are  unworthy  of 
serious  discussion  may  yet  occasion  warm  words 
between  brethren,  and,  perhaps,  cause  painful 
alienations  and  even  disruptions  in  our  churches. 
There  are  men  who,  for  the  most  part,  are  pos- 
sessed of  a  dumb  spirit  in  meetings  for  prayer  and 
conference,  who  yet  can  speak  earnestly  and  fer- 


286    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

vently  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour  or  more  on  some 
unimportant  topic  in  the  church  meetings.  Numer- 
ous church  meetings  are  snares  of  the  enemy  ;  they 
are  entirely  unnecessary.  To  give  a  whole  even- 
ing, as  is  often  done  in  some  churches,  to  the  or- 
dinary routine  business  of  the  average  church,  is  to 
waste  much  valuable  time  and  to  incur  serious, 
positive  danger.  Were  matters  thoroughly  matured 
in  the  advisory  committee  meeting,  the  business 
meeting  of  the  church  could  be  disposed  of  in  a 
few  minutes.  Churches  receiving  scores  of  mem- 
bers, contributing  thousands  of  dollars,  and  engaged 
in  various  benevolent  enterprises,  requiring  much 
thought  and  involving  large  outlay,  are  knov\^n  to 
limit  their  monthly  business  meetings  to  ten  or 
fifteen  minutes  at  the  close  of  an  ordinary  prayer 
meeting.  We  earnestly  affirm  that  the  loose,  dis- 
jointed, immatured  methods  so  often  seen  in  the 
business  meetings  of  some  churches  are  a  reproach 
to  our  common  sense  and  are  a  challenge  to  the 
worst  elements  of  our  poor,  human  nature.  On 
this  subject  we  could  speak  with  warmth,  almost 
amounting  to  vehemence,  of  the  folly  of  the 
methods  so  often  pursued.  Freedom  of  discussion 
is  the  right  of  every  member,  but  liberty  is  not 
license.  To  turn  a  church  meeting  into  an  arena 
for  acrimonious  debate  is  the  height  of  folly,  if  not 
of  crime.  What  pitiful  instances  every  reader  has 
known  !     God  forgive  our  stupidity  ! 

But,   is  such  a   committee   "  Baptistic "  ?     Is  it 
not  an  introduction  of  an  unduly  Presbyterial  ele 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  28/ 

ment  into  our  churches  ?  We  have  a  right  to 
what  is  good,  even  though  other  denominations 
adopt  somewhat  similar  methods.  It  is  surely  al- 
ways the  privilege  of  a  Baptist  church,  by  its  own 
free  vote,  to  delegate  a  part  of  its  work  to  a  com- 
mittee of  its  choice.  Surely  it  is  "  Baptistic  "  to 
desire  and  to  receive  good  advice.  Whatever,  In 
a  matter  of  mere  expediency,  bears  the  unmistak- 
able stamp  of  sanctified  common  sense,  and  is  not 
contraiy  to  New  Testament  teaching,  ought  to  be 
observed  by  us.  That  this  committee  bears  that 
stamp,  the  testimony  of  hundreds  of  Baptists  and 
the  history  of  many  churches  emphatically  affirm. 
Is  there  any  authority  in  the  word  of  God  for  such 
a  committee  as  this  ?  That  is  the  true  question 
for  Baptists  to  ask  and  answer.  There  is  at  least  a 
suggestion  found  in  Gal.  2  :  2  which  clearly  bears 
upon  this  point.  Here  we  see  that  the  Apostle 
Paul  privately,  or  as  the  word  might  be  rendered, 
severally,  took  counsel  of  brethren  "  which  were  of 
reputation."  Doubtless  there  were  good  reasons 
why  the  apostle  sought  for  this  private  interview 
with  representative  men  in  Jerusalem.  It  is  certain 
that  the  interview  was  not  before  a  promiscuous 
assembly  ;  it  does  not  seem  even  to  have  been  be- 
fore all  the  apostles,  but  simply  in  a  private  man- 
ner with  a  few  of  the  recognized  leaders.  He 
wished  them  to  understand  clearly  the  state  of  the 
case  before  the  matter  became  the  subject  of  public 
discussion.  It  was  greatly  important  to  decide 
whether  the  rites  of  the  Jews  were  to  be  imposed 


288    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

on  converts  from  the  Gentiles.  This  was  the  chief 
point  on  which  advice  was  sought,  and  not  whether 
the  gospel  should  be  preached  to  the  Gentiles  ;  on 
that  point  full  revelation  had  been  given  previously 
to  the  Apostle  Peter.  The  Jews  were  warmly 
attached  to  their  ancient  customs  ;  and  the  attach- 
ment continued  even  after  they  had  embraced  the 
Christian  faith.  It  was  a  delicate  matter,  there- 
fore, even  to  suggest  that  it  was  now  no  longer 
necessary  to  observe  these  customs.  If  a  matter 
so  delicate  were  discussed  before  a  promiscuous 
assembly,  great  excitement  would  necessarily  have 
resulted.  In  this  private  conference  the  Apostle 
Paul  could  much  more  readily  explain  his  motives 
and  emphasize  his  reasons. 

It  was  also  most  important  that  a  few  of  the 
representative  men  should  be  made  to  understand 
clearly  Paul's  position,  that  their  influence  might 
be  used  to  prevent  misunderstanding,  and  probably 
alienations.  He  therefore  arranged  for  this  private 
interview.  These  brethren  were  his  cabinet,  his 
advisers,  virtually  his  advisory  committee.  Exam- 
ining the  history,  we  see  clearly  that  the  course 
pursued  contributed  to.  a  happy  solution  of  this 
vexed  problem.  All  ground  for  discussion,  it  must 
be  admitted,  was  not  removed,  for  when  the  matter 
came  to  be  submitted  to  the  apostles  and  leaders, 
as  we  see  by  Acts  15:7,  there  were  some  of  the 
sect  of  the  Pharisees  who  still  maintained  that  the 
Gentiles  must  keep  the  law  of  Moses  ;  and  but  for 
the  wise  precaution  of  the  apostle  in  calling  about 


THE    ORGANIZATION    OF    A    CHURCH  289 

him  that  advisory  committee,  no  one  can  predict 
what  the  issue  of  a  more  public  discussion  might 
have  been.  In  this  interview  "  with  them  which 
were  of  reputation,"  Peter  and  James  had  all  their 
difficulties  removed  and  their  convictions  clarified. 
When  the  public  assembly  was  held,  they  were 
able  to  submit  views  which  brought  the  whole 
controversy  to  a  speedy  termination.  The  meeting 
of  the  advisory  committee  was  one  of  the  most 
marked  illustrations  of  the  prudence  which  -we  so 
often  find  in  the  life  of  Paul.  It  is  always  a  dan- 
gerous thing  to  discuss  differences  of  a  delicate 
nature  when  the  passions  and  prejudices  of  a  mixed 
audience  are  aroused.  The  truth  of  this  statement 
many  of  our  churches  know  to  their  great  sorrow 
and  to  the  dishonor  of  their  Master, 

We  have  not  made  a  separate  classification  of 
the  election  of  a  clerk.  This  matter  may  seem  to 
many  too  trivial  to  be  mentioned  in  this  paper. 
We  are,  however,  convinced  to  the  contrary.  It  is 
of  great  importance  that  a  man  of  good  common 
sense  and  some  familiarity  with  methods  of  busi- 
ness and  forms  of  records  should  be  elected  for 
this  office.  The  ability  to  record  the  proceedings 
of  a  church  meeting  in  words  properly  spelled  and 
which  clearly  express  the  exact  truth  is  very  im- 
portant. If  the  clerk  is  absent,  the  very  first  busi- 
ness will  be  to  appoint  another.  Many  churches 
neglect  to  guard  against  this  apparently  unimpor- 
tant omission,  and  the  result  is  incorrect  records 
and  serious  difficulties  of  various  kinds.     Church 

T 


290    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

councils  often  give  painful  revelations  as  to  the  care- 
less methods  of  doing  business  in  some  churches. 
The  multiplication  of  church  meetings  for  the 
granting  of  letters  and  the  receiving  of  members  is 
often  a  great  evil  ;  it  is  rare,  indeed,  when  it  is 
necessary  to  have  more  than  the  regular  meeting 
each  month.  The  exercise  of  sound  judgment,  and 
the  refusal  to  gratify  mere  personal  whims,  will  gen- 
erally obviate  the  necessity  of  multiplying  meetings. 
We  are  convinced  that  nearly  all  the  sad  aliena- 
tions which  too  often  occur  in  our  churches  might 
be  avoided,  and  that  all  the  business  of  the  church 
would  be  greatly  facilitated  by  the  appointment  of 
such  an  advisory  committee  as  is  here  recom- 
mended. No  language  is  too  strong  to  express 
the  deep  conviction  cherished  in  favor  of  this  com- 
mittee, and  the  danger  which  will  arise  where  busi- 
ness of  all  kinds  and  in  all  stages  of  immaturity  is 
thrown  into  a  church  meeting  for  general  dis- 
cussion. 

This  paper  is  not  given  with  the  thought  that  it 
presents  an  exhaustive  statement  of  the  organiza- 
tion of  a  church  with  wide-reaching  relations. 
Other  committees  will  be  considered  later.  The 
bodies  named,  however,  are  deemed  to  be  neces- 
sary to  a  church  whose  organization  is  vigorous, 
symmetrical,  harmonious,  and  permanent. 


XII 
THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  THE  CHURCH 

THE  development  of  a  church  of  Christ  is  an 
object  of  sufficient  difficulty  to  tax  the  abil- 
ity, and  of  sufficient  importance  to  stimulate  the 
energy  of  the  most  consecrated  pastor.  A  vast 
amount  of  talent  is  latent  in  every  church.  This 
fact  causes  perplexity,  anxiety,  and  sorrow  to  every 
thoughtful  pastor.  How  shall  this  talent  be  dis- 
covered, developed,  and  consecrated  ?  This  is  a 
question  to  which  the  most  careful  thought  and 
earnest  action  should  be  given.  The  answer  to  it 
is  to  be  found  partly  in  the  complete  organization 
of  the  church,  as  was  suggested  in  the  previous 
paper.  Some  specific  reply,  however,  should  be 
given,  and  some  suggestions  made  which  may  lead 
to  the  discovery  and  development  of  the  dormant 
powers  in  the  members  of  our  churches.  To  this 
task  this  paper  is  devoted. 

I.  Attention  is  directed,  in  the  first  place,  to  the 
development  of  the  social  life  of  the  church.  The 
first  suggestion  made  under  this  head  is  the  im- 
portance of  creating  and  diffusing  a  welcoming  at- 
mosphere in  the  public  services  of  God's  house. 
It  is  difficult  to  define,  although  very  easy  to  feel, 
the  presence  or  absence  of  this  atmosphere.     It  is 

291 


292    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

worth  much  when  men  and  women  are  made  to 
feel  that  in  the  church  of  Christ  they  are  treated 
according  to  what  they  are,  and  not  according  to 
what  they  have  ;  that  it  is  not  the  size  of  a  man's 
bank  account,  or  the  character  o!"  his  clothes,  or  the 
style  of  his  living,  but  the  uprightness  of  his  char- 
acter and  the  consecration  of  his  life  which  deter- 
mine the  esteem  in  which  he  shall  be  held.  The 
church  is  not  a  club,  meeting  in  the  winter  time  in 
the  city  and  in  the  summer  by  the  seashore  or 
among  the  mountains.  Its  members  are  not  to  be 
selected  by  the  rules  which  govern  secular  organ- 
izations ;  its  spirit  is  born  of  the  love  of  Christ  and 
the  desire  to  serve  him.  The  world  divides  society 
horizontally,  selecting  each  layer  most  in  harmony 
with  its  spirit  and  purpose  ;  a  true  church  like  the 
gospel  of  Christ,  divides  society  vertically,  cutting 
through  all  the  layers  and  permeating  all  with  the 
meek  and  lowly  mind  of  Christ  and  inspiring  all 
with  his  constraining  love.  When  this  spirit  has 
been  generated  and  widely  diffused  it  will  do  much 
toward  correcting  false  ideas  regarding  social  dis- 
tinctions among  the  members  of  any  church.  It  is 
not  claimed  that  the  social  distinctions  can  be  ob- 
literated in  some  of  the  relations  of  life  ;  but  it  is 
affirmed  that  in  the  house  of  God  there  should  be 
neither  rich  nor  poor  ;  both  should  kneel  together 
before  God  in  worship,  and  should  stand  together 
before  God  in  work,  remembering  that  he  is  the 
maker  of  all. 

In    the    application   of  this    spirit   some   points 


THE    DEVELOPMENT    OF    THE    CHURCH  293 

should  be  noted.  Much  will  depend  upon  the 
manner  and  spirit  of  the  ushers  in  any  church. 
Strangers  coming  to  a  church  judge  the  spirit  of 
pastor  and  people  by  the  man  whom  they  meet  in 
the  vestibule  or  the  aisle.  This  is  inevitable  ;  this 
is  fitting.  Great  care,  therefore,  should  be  taken 
in  selecting  and  training  the  men  who  are  to  be 
the  interpreters  to  strangers  of  the  spirit  and  life  of 
the  congregation.  They  ought  to  be  men  who 
have  learned  the  spirit  of  true  etiquette  in  its  no- 
blest school,  the  school  of  Christ  The  Great 
Teacher  laid  down  a  universal  law  which  underlies 
all  genuine  courtesy.  The  golden  rule  is  the  high- 
est law  of  etiquette.  The  man  who  does  not  pos- 
sess its  spirit  should  not  occupy  this  position. 

The  position  is  in  every  respect  a  trying  one.  In 
churches  where  pews  are  rented  they  must  be  re- 
served for  their  regular  occupants  until  the  expira- 
tion of  the  recognized  time.  But  some  pews  are 
likely  never  to  be  fully  occupied  by  those  who  rent 
them.  All  these  things  the  usher  must  bear  in 
mind  so  that  strangers  may  be  seated  at  the  ear- 
liest possible  moment.  He  must  accommodate  the 
feeble  and  timid  who  do  not  wish  to  walk  far  up 
the  aisle  ;  he  must  also  have  regard  for  the  com- 
paratively blind  and  deaf  who  wish  to  see  and  hear 
the  minister ;  he  must  consult  the  wishes  of  those 
into  whose  pews  strangers  are  put.  He  must  also 
be  ready  to  take  messages  from  strangers  to  the 
pastor,  and  be  ready  also  to  introduce  them  to  him 
at   the   close   of  the   service.     Indeed,  for   many 


294    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

reasons  there  is  no  position  in  connection  with 
public  worship — save  that  of  the  preacher  himself, 
or  possibly  the  sexton,  who  is  in  some  respects  of 
more  consequence  than  any  other  officer — more 
important  than  that  occupied  by  the  usher.  Many 
persons  have  turned  away  from  places  of  worship 
because  of  thoughtless  treatment  or  intentional  dis- 
courtesy on  the  part  of  the  ushers  ;  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  many  have  enjoyed  the  entire  service 
and  determined  to  return  because  of  the  opposite 
treatment  on  the  part  of  this  important  personage. 
The  usher  should  be  recognized  as  under  the  di- 
rection not  primarily  of  the  trustees  but  rather  of 
the  pastor  and  deacons  and  other  religious  officers 
of  the  church.  The  work  of  ushers  should  be  per- 
formed by  them  not  in  a  commercial  but  in  a  thor- 
oughly Christian  spirit.  The  solemn  directions  of 
James  regarding  the  man  with  goodly  apparel,  the 
gold  ring,  and  the  poor  man  in  vile  raiment  must  be 
scrupulously  observed  ;  to  do  this  an  usher  needs 
to  be  wise  as  a  serpent  and  harmless  as  a  dove, 
because  of  the  rights  and  sometimes  the  prejudices 
of  pewholders.  There  should  be  a  head-usher 
who  shall  have  entire  charge  of  the  work.  Gentle- 
men of  good  social,  business,  and  religious  stand- 
ing, gentlemen  with  good  address,  courteous  man- 
ners, and  kindly  faces  should  be  appointed  to  this 
service.  It  is  difficult  to  overestimate  its  impor- 
tance. The  idea  must  be  emphasized  that  this  is 
religious  work  and  must  be  performed  in  a  thor- 
oughly religious  spirit. 


THE    DEVELOPMENT    OF    THE    CHURCH  295 

Another  consideration  is  the  importance  of  a  cor- 
dial greeting  to  strangers  by  pewholders.  Cour- 
teous and  Christian  service  may  be  rendered  by 
pewholders  as  they  mingle  in  the  vestibule  with 
one  another  and  with  strangers.  Instead  of  per- 
mitting strangers  to  wait  until  the  arrival  of  the 
hour  when  all  pews  are  free  to  the  ushers,  pew- 
holders ought  to  give  strangers  the  hand  of  cordial 
welcome  and  the  word  of  hearty  greeting,  and,  so 
far  as  there  is  room,  a  fraternal  invitation  to  pass 
in  at  once  to  seats  in  their  pews.  This  invitation 
at  the  beginning  of  the  sei-vice  can  be  emphasized 
by  courtesy  during  the  service  and  by  an  invitation 
at  the  close  to  return  whenever  the  stranger  may 
be  so  disposed.  Much  missionary  work  may  thus 
be  done  while  going  down  the  aisles  or  lingering 
about  the  doors  of  the  house  of  God.  We  lose 
many  opportunities  for  sowing  the  good  seed  of 
the  kingdom  by  neglect  at  this  point.  The  same 
spirit  should  be  manifested  to  persons  sitting  in 
adjoining  pews.  Why  should  a  formal  introduc- 
tion be  necessary  among  regular  attendants  at  the 
house  of  God  ?  Why  should  men  stand  aloof  when 
they  are  known  to  one  another  perhaps  as  mem- 
bers of  the  same  church,  certainly  as  attendants  on 
the  same  ministry? 

This  formalism  is  as  ridiculous  as  it  is  unchristian. 
It  is  difficult  for  a  pastor  to  speak  with  becoming 
calmness  when  contemplating  such  unbecoming 
stupidity.  Old  church-members  often  err  at  this 
point  toward  new  members  coming  into  the  fellow- 


296    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

ship  of  the  church  ;  but  the  new  members,  in  turn, 
err  in  precisely  the  same  way  toward  newer  mem- 
bers. New  members  wait  for  the  older  members 
to  speak  to  them  ;  in  the  meantime  scores,  pos 
sibly  hundreds,  of  others,  who  are  greater  strangers 
than  they  have  come  into  the  congregation  to 
whom  they  ought  to  be  the  first  to  speak.  An  il- 
lustration will  make  the  thought  clearer.  A  few 
years  ago  a  charming  old  gentleman  took  a  pew  in 
a  city  church.  He  had  come  from  the  South,  and 
had  made  his  home  in  the  North.  He  said  to  the 
pastor  after  he  had  been  six  months  in  attendance  : 
"  I  wish  the  gentleman  behind  me  would  speak  to 
me."  The  reply  to  his  great  surprise  was:  "The 
gentleman  behind  you  has  already  expressed  a  sim- 
ilar desire  in  regard  to  you.  You  have  been  in 
the  congregation  three  months  longer  than  he, 
and  he  has  wondered  why  you  have  not  extended 
to  him  a  cordial  greeting."  He  had  never  dreamed 
that  he  was  neglecting  his  duty  in  this  way  ;  he  had 
thought  of  himself  as  the  stranger  to  whom  all 
others  ought  to  speak.  Thousands  more  in  our 
churches  are  doing  the  same  thing  ;  they  are  wait- 
ing to  be  spoken  to  when  they  ought  themselves 
to  speak  to  those  who  are  greater  strangers  than 
they.  We  need  here,  as  everywhere  in  Christian 
work,  sanctified  common  sense.  It  is  difficult  to 
have  patience  with  those  who  are  all  the  time  wait- 
ing for  a  chance  to  be  offended.  Men  with  griev- 
ances are  a  grievous  trial  to  any  minister  ;  it  must 
be  admitted  that  in  most  cases  they  themselves  are 


THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  THE  CHURCH    297 


at  fault.  Why  should  they  go  about  watching  for 
slights  ?  On  the  other  hand,  why  should  others  be 
afraid  to  extend  a  cordial  welcome  ?  Men  who 
are  afraid  their  social  position  would  be  compro- 
mised by  welcoming  strangers  in  the  house  of  God, 
even  though  those  strangers  may  be  of  a  different 
social  grade  from  themselves,  must  have  a  social 
position  which  is  very  unstable.  Those  whose  po- 
sition is  established  and  recognized,  so  that  it  is 
beyond  dispute,  never  hesitate  to  reach  out  the 
hand  to  welcome  a  man  whatever  his  position  may 
be.  When  men  have  a  sincere  love  for  Christ  all 
social  distinctions  vanish,  at  least  in  the  public 
worship  of  God. 

Still  another  point  of  great  value  is  the  manner 
and  spirit  of  the  pastor  himself  He  can  do  much 
to  create  and  diffuse  this  welcoming  atmosphere. 
The  tone  of  his  voice,  and,  indeed,  his  whole  man- 
ner in  conducting  the  service,  will  help  or  hurt  in 
this  direction.  As  tending  toward  an  expression 
of  the  pastor's  kindly  feeling  in  this  regard,  it  is 
well  to  put  cards  into  the  pews,  giving  a  statement 
of  the  hours  when  he  can  see  those  who  desire  to 
meet  him  on  any  matter  of  importance,  and  es- 
pecially those  who  wish  to  talk  with  him  regarding 
their  personal  salvation.  Even  though  the  blanks 
on  these  cards  for  names  and  addresses  may  not 
be  filled  up  by  persons  in  the  pews,  the  presence 
of  the  card  greatly  helps  to  foster  the  spirit  of 
which  we  speak.  It  has  also  been  found  to  be 
conducive  to  this  spirit  to  invite  strangers  to  meet 


298    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

him  at  the  close  of  the  service.  In  this  way  he 
gets  the  names  and  addresses  of  those  who  come 
within  the  boundary  of  his  natural  pastoral  field  ; 
on  these  strangers  he  may  very  shortly  make  pas- 
toral calls.  He  may  have  in  this  way  an  oppor- 
tunity to  speak  a  personal  word  to  those  who  are 
without  Christ,  and  also  a  word  of  cheer  to  Chris- 
tians from  distant  parts  of  our  country  or  from 
other  lands.  Words  spoken  in  this  way  have  often 
brought  the  tear  of  sympathy  to  the  eye  of  a  stran- 
ger and '  have  often  elicited  from  him  expressions 
of  hearty  appreciation.  Seed  sown  by  the  wayside 
in  this  manner  may  bring  forth  a  rich  harvest  whose 
full  fruitage  may  not  be  seen  on  this  side  of  the 
great  white  throne. 

The  second  general  thought  in  connection  with 
the  social  life  of  the  church  is  the  value  of  church 
sociables.  These  should  be  held,  when  accom- 
modations will  permit,  in  connection  with  the  church 
home  itself  Many  persons  will  attend  when  gath- 
erings are  thus  held  who  would  not  go  to  private 
homes.  There  may  be  advantages  in  having  the 
sociables  at  the  home  of  some  of  the  members  ;  but 
if  the  church  embraces  in  its  membership  persons 
of  widely  different  social  conditions  it  is  better,  so 
long  and  so  far  as  these  foolish  ideas  prevail,  to 
have  the  sociable  in  the  church  home.  There 
ought  to  be  some  form  of  literary  or  musical  exer- 
cises ;  those  are  generally  most  conducive  to  the 
social  idea  and  purpose  which  are  conducted  by 
the  members  of  the  church  itself      The  whole  at- 


THE    DEVELOPMENT    OF    THE    CHURCH  299 

mosphere  of  the  sociable  should  be  strictly  relig- 
ious ;  every  part  of  every  form  of  work  in  connec- 
tion with  the  house  of  God  should  be  religious. 
Whatever  in  the  music  or  in  the  social  life  of  the 
church  fails  to  deepen  the  religious  spirit  fails  to 
accomplish  its  highest  end.  The  question  has 
sometimes  been  asked  if  the  church  sociable  does 
not  interfere  with  a  revival.  If  it  does  the  revival 
must  be  a  very  weak  one  or  the  sociable  a  very 
bad  one.  No  sociable  is  worthy  of  the  name 
except  it  be  one  which  will  help  a  revival.  Its 
spirit  may  be  thoroughly  joyous,  and  yet  so  relig- 
ious that  there  would  be  no  incongruity  in  stopping 
its  exercises  at  almost  any  moment  for  prayer  and 
religious  conversation.  Sociables  of  this  character 
prove  to  be  vastly  helpful  in  deepening  religious 
experience  and  in  leading  to  a  public  profession  of 
Christ.  There  is  no  reason  why  sociables  should 
degenerate  into  worldliness,  or  into  any  form  of 
exercise  that  shall  be  inimical  to  religious  emotion 
and  endeavor.  The  three-fold  purpose  of  develop- 
ing the  social,  intellectual,  and  religious  life  of  the 
church  may  be  secured  by  a  well-conducted  church 
sociable.  There  ought  to  be  no  place  in  any  part 
of  church  work  for  flippancy,  frivolity,  and  mere 
secularity.      The  whole  spirit  must  be  religious. 

A  third  point  in  connection  with  the  social  life 
of  a  church  is  the  value  of  intervisitation.  Some- 
times committees  on  strangers  can  be  induced  to 
visit  them  in  their  homes  so  soon  as  their  names 
and  addresses  are  secured.     Sometimes  the  deacons 


300    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

of  churches  can  perform  this  work ;  but  in  many- 
churches  it  is  difficult  for  deacons  to  render  this 
service.  In  our  larger  cities  many  of  them  Hve  far 
from  their  places  of  business.  They  leave  their 
homes  early  in  the  morning  and  return  to  them 
late  in  the  evening.  They  have  little  time,  there- 
fore, for  work  of  this  sort.  Deacons  who  are  not 
so  closely  tied  down  to  business  often  spend  much 
time  for  the  Master  in  connection  with  various 
benevolent  organizations,  meeting  with  committees, 
and  engaging  in  other  forms  of  work.  At  the  same 
time  those  who  move  in  certain  circles  of  society  are 
obliged  to  give  much  time  to  the  social  demands  of 
their  position.  This  is  especially  true  of  many 
ladies.  Those  who  have  less  of  this  world's  goods 
have  important  domestic  duties  to  perform.  How 
then  shall  a  system  of  intervisitation  be  carried  on  ? 
Committees  can  do  something ;  they  might  do 
much.  It  is  important  that  those  who  live  in  a 
given  section  of  a  city  or  vnllage,  and  who  journey  to 
church  together,  should  know  one  another.  It  has 
been  found  to  be  a  good  plan  for  the  pastor,  and 
others  who  make  visits  in  the  congregation  in  the 
more  formal  or  regular  way,  to  give  those  on  whom 
they  call  the  names  of  a  few  others  in  the  imme- 
diate neighborhood,  with  the  urgent  request  that 
they  be  called  upon  at  the  earliest  possible  moment. 
Perhaps  the  pastor's  next  call  will  be  upon  one  of 
the  persons  whom  he  wished  the  others  to  call  upon. 
Let  this  process  be  repeated  ;  and  before  he  shall 
have  completed  his  visitation  of  the  neighborhood 


THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  THE  CHURCH    3OI 

he  will  have  organized  a  regular  system  of  inter- 
visiting.  The  members  of  the  church  will  be 
amazed  at  one  another  for  the  next  few  weeks  be- 
cause of  the  sudden  desire  which  is  manifested  for 
one  to  call  upon  others  in  the  neighborhood. 
Persons  meeting  one  another  in  the  vestibule,  in 
the  street  car,  and  on  the  streets,  will  find  that  they 
know  one  another  as  never  before,  and  thus  they 
will  be  drawn  together  in  Christian  sympathy  and 
endeavor.  All  this  means  work.  But  the  result  is 
worth  the  effort. 

2.  The  development  of  the  church  in  its  intel- 
lectual life  now  claims  our  attention.  The  sermons 
of  the  pastor  will  greatly  tend  toward  and  will  in 
some  degree,  secure  this  result.  A  good  sermon 
stirs  every  element  of  the  soul.  To  put  a  man  into 
contact  with  the  great  thoughts  of  God  is  to  stim- 
ulate all  his  noblest  powers.  No  man  can  do  his  best 
intellectual  work  until  he  is  brought  into  sympathy 
with  the  purposes  of  God.  He  must  place  Jesus 
Christ  at  the  center  of  his  intellectual  system,  so 
that  all  truths  may  range  themselves  in  their  proper 
relations  to  him  who  is  the  truth.  He  who  sits 
most  humbly  at  the  feet  of  Jesus  can  walk  most 
securely  upon  the  dizzy  heights  of  intellectual 
greatness.  Other  things  being  equal,  the  best 
scholar  in  the  school  of  Christ  will  be  the  best 
scholar  in  all  other  schools'  The  influence  of  the 
pastor  in  developing  the  intellectual  forces  of  his 
congregation  in  this  direction  is  simply  incalculable. 
As  a  result  of  the  stimulus  which  the  pastor  thus 


302    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

gives  there  will  grow  up  literary  circles  in  the 
church  itself.  When  these  spring  up  naturally, 
and  are  wisely  directed,  they  exercise  an  excellent 
influence  upon  the  young  men  and  women.  Lit- 
erary circles  may  be  of  both  sexes,  meeting  in  the 
homes  of  the  members.  A  few  conservative  men 
and  women  in  one  such  circle  will  help  to  hold  it 
to  the  purpose  for  which  it  was  organized,  and  will 
make  its  intellectual  attainments  contribute  to 
growth  in  grace  and  service  in  the  church.  Circles 
may  be  of  one  sex  alone  and,  under  the  direction 
of  persons  of  good  judgment,  may  meet  in  some 
part  of  the  church  home.  Much  that  young  men 
receive  in  connection  with  Young  Men's  Christian 
Associations  they  ought  to  receive  in  connection 
with  their  own  church.  With  the  workings  of  such 
literary  societies  some  pastors  are  quite  familiar, 
and  they  are  led  to  bear  their  emphatic  testimony 
to  their  value.  Here,  as  everywhere,  conservative 
wisdom  and  Christian  consecration  are  absolutely 
necessary.  Out  of  this  spirit  and  along  the  line  of 
this  endeavor  there  might  come  courses  of  lectures 
to  be  given  in  connection  with  other  forms  of 
church  work,  or  simply  for  their  own  sake.  It  is 
easy  to  secure  lectures  from  the  professional  men 
of  any  city  or  country  village.  These  lectures 
might  take  a  comparatively  wide  range  ;  some  of 
the  lecturers  might  be'  physicians  who  should  dis- 
cuss matters  of  health  and  related  topics ;  any 
number  of  pastors  would  assist  Lecturers  on 
history,  science,  art,  and  various  literary  subjects 


THE    DEVELOPMENT    OF    THE    CHURCH  3O3 

might  be   readily  secured  and  would  be   heartily 
welcomed. 

In  addition  to  these  indirect  methods  the  wise 
pastor  in  his  leadership  of  his  church  will  use  direct 
efforts  to  induce  young  men  and  women  to  pursue 
courses  of  liberal  study.  He  must  be  constantly 
watchful  to  secure  men  and  women  who  are  likely 
to  be  faithful  students,  that  he  may  encourage  them 
to  enter  upon  the  work  of  securing  an  education. 
The  exercise  of  wise  discrimination  in  selecting  the 
persons,  and  then  a  few  cheering  words  spoken  to 
them,  would  lead  scores  and  hundreds  to  enter  our 
Baptist  academies  next  fall.  We  do  not  urge  that 
all  these  young  men  should  go  into  the  ministry  in 
the  technical  sense  ;  but  we  do  urge  that  it  is  the 
duty  of  all  to  make  the  most  of  themselves  for  God 
and  humanity.  No  man  has  a  right  to  be  an  intel- 
lectual dwarf  when  he  might  be  comparatively  an 
intellectual  giant.  Every  man  should,  as  far  as 
lieth  in  him,  walk  with  his  head  among  the  stars. 
A  few  words  spoken  by  a  Presbyterian  pastor  in 
the  central  part  of  the  State  of  New  York  led  Na- 
than Bishop  to  pursue  a  college  course.  During 
that  college  course  he  developed  many  of  those 
sterling  qualities  which  made  him  for  more  than  a 
quarter  of  a  century  a  great  power  in  his  denom- 
ination and  to  Christianity  as  a  whole.  The  cul- 
ture received  in  college  led  to  his  position  as  a 
tutor  at  Brown  University ;  it  led  to  the  position  of 
Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  for  the  State 
of  Massachusetts  ;  it  did  much  to  lay  the  founda- 


304    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

tion  of  his  great  and  good  influence  during  his 
public  career.  The  space  occupied  by  this  entire 
article  might  be  given  to  this  one,  feature  of  the 
subject  discussed.  We  cannot  too  earnestly  urge 
upon  our  brethren  that  they  shall  do  their  full  duty 
at  this  point.  The  cry  for  an  educated  ministry 
has  been  heard  ;  the  cry  must  go  out  now  for  a 
more  generally  educated  laity.  Laym.en  are  com- 
ing now  into  positions  of  prominence  and  power  as 
never  before  ;  in  business  life,  political  life,  social 
life,  and  religious  life,  they  are  coming  to  the  front. 
Laymen  are  becoming  the  leaders  of  great  reforms 
in  all  departments  of  religious  endeavor.  We  need 
such  men  for  Sunday-school  superintendents,  Bible- 
class  teachers,  and  for  other  forms  of  work  in  con- 
nection with  the  church  of  God.  Let  the  cry  go 
out ;  let  the  ministry  do  their  full  duty,  and  acad- 
emies and  colleges  will  be  crowded  with  our  noble 
young  men  and  women  who  shall  be  fitted  by  cul- 
ture and  by  Christianity  for  the  highest  positions  in 
the  State  and  in  the  Church. 

3.  The  third  main  thought  of  this  article  is  the 
development  of  the  missionary  life  of  the  church. 
The  church  is  to  be  benevolent ;  but  it  must  be 
also  beneficent.  Benevolence  is  well-wishing  ;  be- 
neficence is  well-doing.  The  first  comes  into  the 
sphere  of  the  heart ;  the  second  into  the  sphere  of 
the  hand  as  well  as  the  heart.  Benevolence  without 
beneficence  is  dead,  being  alone.  The  church  must 
possess  both  of  these  characteristics.  The  church 
must  be  a  missionary  organization  in  all  the  length 


THE    DEVELOPMENT    OF   THE    CHURCH  305 

and  breadth  of  that  great  word.  It  is  the  instinct 
of  the  new  Hfe  in  the  soul  to  give  of  that  hfe.  We 
are  redeemed  that  we  may  aid  in  the  redemption 
of  others  ;  we  are  Christianized  that  we  may  Chris- 
tianize. A  man  who  can  keep  his  rehgion  to  him- 
self has  a  religion  not  worth  keeping.  Christ  can- 
not be  hidden  within  the  soul  where  he  abides. 
His  presence  will  reveal  itself  in  the  glance  of  the 
eye,  the  grasp  of  the  hand,  and  the  tones  of  the 
voice.  This  missionary  spirit  must  be  present  also 
in  obedience  to  the  command  of  Christ.  Tele- 
graph and  telephone,  steamship  and  railway,  are 
the  messengers  of  the  Cross.  They  are  girdling  the 
world  for  truth  and  God.  The  church  which  fails 
to  possess  and  manifest  the  missionary  spirit  ceases 
to  be  a  church  of  Christ.  It  is  robbed  of  its  high 
honor  and  its  great  glory.  It  consents  to  degrade 
itself  and  to  dishonor  its  Lord. 

The  church  ought  also  to  possess  this  spirit 
for  the  sake  of  its  own  spiritual  life  and  growth. 
Nothing  is  more  certain  than  the  great  diamond 
truth  of  our  Lord  that  "  it  is  more  blessed  to  give 
than  to  receive."  Giving  for  Christ  is  not  simply 
a  duty,  it  is  a  privilege.  It  is  not  simply  a  priv- 
ilege, it  is  a  glory.  It  develops  manhood  ;  it  de- 
velops Christhood.  It  lifts  a  man  from  his  own 
selfish  nature  to  the  lofty  mountain  top  where  he 
may  breathe  the  pure  atmosphere,  and  may  bask 
in  the  sunshine  of  noble  achievement.  It  enables 
him  to  sing  a  Tc  Dcum  inspired  by  generous  be- 
stowment,   while   others  sing  a   Miserere  born   of 

u 


3o6    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

selfish  withholding.  God  is  the  eternal  Giver ;  he 
would  cease  to  be  God  if  he  ceased  to  give.  Chris- 
tians who  cease  to  give,  cease  to  be  godlike  ;  they 
cease  to  be  Christians.  The  Dead  Sea  is  dead  be- 
cause it  always  receives  and  never  bestows.  Geog- 
raphers tell  us  that  it  has  no  outlet,  and  that  from  the 
nature  of  the  case  it  cannot  have  one,  visible  or  in- 
visible.     The  Christian  who  never  bestows,  dies. 

Each  one  of  these  three  reasons  for  the  culture 
of  the  missionary  spirit  in  the  church  might  be  dis- 
cussed at  length.  But  we  address  ourselves  to  the 
practical  questions  involved.  How  shall  these 
principles  be  brought  to  bear  in  actual  church  life  ? 
A  few  suggestions  only  can  be  made  at  this  point. 
The  pastor  must  begin  with  those  who  are  young 
in  years  and  in  the  Christian  life.  He  must  insist 
upon  willingness  to  give  for  Christ's  cause  as  an 
evidence  of  conversion  when  persons  are  received 
by  baptism  into  the  church.  When  we  are  con- 
verted we  profess  to  give  all  to  Christ  in  joyous  self- 
surrender.  If  Christians  are  not  trained  to  this 
duty  in  the  beginning  of  their  Christian  life,  nothing 
short  of  dynamite  or  an  earthquake  will  move  them 
when  they  have  grown  old  in  miserliness.  Covet- 
ousness  is  idolatry.  Of  this  idolatry  many  of  the 
members  of  our  churches  are  guilty.  It  would  be 
an  excellent  thing  to  make  the  charge,  furnish  the 
proof,  and  exclude  the  guilty.  Such  an  example 
might  be  blessed  to  their  own  spiritual  good,  and 
it  certainly  would  have  a  wholesome  influence  over 
others  who  are  guilty  of  the  same  sin. 


THE  DEVELOPMENT  OF  THE  ChCRCH    307 

The  pastor  must  also  urge  men  to  give  when  they 
are  relatively  poor.  If  they  do  not  give  then  they 
will  not  give  when  they  are  absolutely  rich.  The 
accumulation  of  wealth  often  closes  and  hardens 
the  heart ;  its  loss  sometimes  opens  both  heart  and 
hand.  Sometimes  the  more  God  lavishes  upon 
men  the  narrower  and  meaner  they  become.  Every 
man,  woman,  and  child  should  be  taught  to  give. 
Further,  the  pastor  must  insist  upon  giving  from 
the  highest  motives.  It  is  blessed  to  give  because 
of  the  good  which  others  receive.  It  is  blessed  to 
give  because  of  the  reflex  influence  upon  the  giver's 
own  soul.  But  giving  must  be  inspired  by  even 
higher  motives.  It  must  be  for  Christ's  special 
honor.  It  is  often  as  much  a  pastv)r's  duty  to  take 
up  a  collection  as  to  administer  baptism  or  the 
Lord's  Supper.  Some  of  the  ter^derest  and  most 
glowing  utterances  of  the  Great  Apostle  were  in- 
spired by  taking  up  a  collection.  A  revival  which 
taking  a  collection  for  Christ's  cause  will  hurt  is  a 
revival  not  worth  hurting  or  helping.  All  giving 
which  ministers  to  a  worldly  spirit  is  utterly  beneath 
the  dignity  and  glory  of  Christian  service.  All 
gold,  every  gift  of  every  sort,  finds  its  true  place 
when  laid  at  the  Master's  feet.  The  pastor  himself 
as  a  rule  ought  to  present  all  cases  of  benevolence 
to  his  people.  The  cause  which  is  worthy  of  their 
benefactions  is  worthy  of  his  careful  preparation 
and  earnest  presentation.  We  need  the  large  gifts 
of  the  wealthy,  but  we  need  also  the  smaller  gifts 
of  the  poor.      Our  great  denomination  is  achieving 


308    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

glorious  results,  but  it  has  not  yet  reached  its  highest 
possibilities.  Our  treasuries  are  groaning  and  our 
work  is  languishing  because  God's  people  have  not 
laid  more  on  his  altar.  The  cry  for  retrenchment 
has  been  heard,  even  when  God's  providence  was 
saying  in  a  thousand  voices,  "Go  forward."  We 
rejoice  in  what  has  been  achieved  but  we  must 
go  on  to  greater  endeavors  and  to  grander  results. 
Let  the  church  vote  on  the  objects  which  are  to  be 
presented  during  the  year  ;  the  date  of  presentation 
ought  also  to  be  decided  by  vote.  At  the  prayer 
meeting  preceding  the  date  when  the  object  is  to 
be  presented  by  the  pastor,  that  object  should  be  the 
subject  of  most  earnest  and  united  prayer.  Let  the 
missionary  concert  be  regularly  observed  ;  let  the 
pastor  give  full  and  accurate  information.  Let  him 
after  due  preparation  present  the  objects  of  benevo- 
lence, and  let  the  duty  of  a  liberal  contribution  be 
pressed  upon  the  people  with  all  the  tenderness 
and  authority  which  he  can  command,  and  a  re- 
sponse will  not  be  lacking.  God  help  pastors  in 
the  performance  of  this  duty.  Glorious  possibilities 
beckon  us  forward  to  greater  sacrifices  and  assure 
us  of  grander  achievements. 

4.  The  development  of  the  church  along  the 
line  of  its  distinctly  religious  life  is  the  fourth  topic 
of  remark  ;  but  the  points  already  made  ought  to 
insure  this  form  of  development.  In  our  busy  life 
much  is  said  about  work  ;  too  little  is  said  about 
religious  thought,  profound  meditation,  and  secret 
communion.      It  is  work,   work,    work.      We  are 


THE    DEVELOPMENT    OF    THE    CHURCH  309 

carried  forward  by  the  hurry,  bustle,  and  excite- 
ment of  the  spirit  of  the  time  in  which  we  hve. 
Our  Sundays  are  days  of  incessant  activity.  Per- 
haps if  we  have  encouraged  the  Martha  spirit,  it 
has  been  at  the  expense  of  the  Mary  spirit ;  the 
spirit  of  active  service  at  the  expense  of  quiet  and 
prolonged  meditation.  We  need  both.  Christ's  life 
is  the  model  for  ours  ;  and  Christ's  life  was  devoted 
to  quiet  communion  with  God  and  active  service  for 
men.  Before  and  after  his  miracles  this  quiet 
communion  was  sought.  No  life  ever  reaches  its 
highest  possibility  on  the  public  street.  Secret 
communion  with  God  is  necessary  for  wise  service 
with  men.  We  would  not  advocate  the  dreamy, 
mystic,  pietistic  spirit  which  has  appeared  in  many 
different  countries  and  centuries  ;  but  it  must  be 
admitted  that  that  spirit  in  Germany,  France,  and 
England  has  wrought  wonders  in  the  formation  of 
character,  and,  when  accompanied  by  wise  activity, 
in  carrying  forward  the  work  of  God.  The  danger 
to-day,  except  in  sporadic  cases,  does  not  lie  in  that 
direction.  It  lies  rather  in  the  direction  of  noisy 
and  shallow  parade.  Books  like  Dr.  Gordon's 
"In  Christ,"  and  the  "Two-fold  Life,"  are  as  nec- 
essary in  our  modern  life'  as  they  are  rare  in  the 
Christian  literature  of  to-day.  To  be  mighty  with 
men  we  must  have  power  with  God.  Sitting  at  his 
feet  is  the  best  preparation  for  running  in  the  way 
of  his  commandments.  When  our  "  hfe  is  hid  with 
Christ  in  God  "  it  will  be  a  daily  benediction  among 
men. 


XIII 
THE  SELECTION  OF  A  CHURCH 

IT  is  almost  impossible  to  over-estimate  the  im- 
portance to  a  young  minister  of  making  a  wise 
selection  in  the  case  of  his  first  church.  The  spirit 
and  character  of  his  entire  ministry  may  depend 
upon  the  wisdom  or  unwisdom  of  that  choice.  A 
blunder  at  this  point  may  create  memories  which 
which  shall  be  barbed  arrows  in  his  soul  ;  a  wise 
choice  at  this  point  will  make  the  recollection  of 
his  earlier  ministry  an  inspiration  and  benediction 
during  all  his  later  years.  The  special  topic  of  this 
article,  therefore,  ought  to  be  earnestly  considered 
by  all  ministerial  students  and  younger  pastors. 
Whatever  may  throw  light  upon  duty  at  this  crisis 
is  to  be  welcomed. 

The  first  suggestion  is.  Do  not  coquet  with 
churches.  Coquetry  is  bad  in  every  relation  in 
life  :  it  is  especially  bad  when  either  the  churches 
or  ministers  of  Christ  are  its  victims.  Ministerial 
students  in  their  relations  to  churches  are  often  ex- 
posed to  this  subtle  temptation.  There  is  a  vast 
deal  of  human  nature  in  young  theologians ;  candor 
compels  the  admission  that  it  is  not  fully  eradicated 
even  in  the  case  of  experienced  pastors.  The  petty 
jealousies  and  foolish  rivalries  of  both  students  and 
310 


THE    SELECTION    OF    A    CHURCH  3II 

pastors  are  not  pleasant  subjects  of  contemplation. 
A  call  from  a  large  and  strong  church  enables  a 
man  to  lay  a  "  flattering  unction  "  to  his  own  soul, 
and  it  gives  him  an  opportunity  to  rejoice  over  his 
less  fortunate  brother.  Such  a  call  gives  fuel  to 
the  fires  of  his  own  ambition,  and  permits  him  to 
see  his  brother  in  the  shadow  caused  by  his  own 
bright  light.  It  may  be  that  his  actual  or  contem- 
plated marriage  relations  may  stimulate  his  zeal  to 
secure  a  flattering  call.  Such  ambitions  are  neither 
manly  nor  Christly ;  but  neither  are  they  unnatural 
nor  ^uncommon.  Ministerial  coquetry,  with  its  va- 
ried and  numerous  blandishments,  often  victimizes 
innocent  churches.  It  must  be  admitted  that  the 
coquetry'  is  sometimes  ecclesiastical  rather  than  min- 
isterial, innocent  ministers  being  the  victims  of  the 
"caresses  and  wheedles"  of  coquetting  churches. 
The  process  by  which  churches  may  be  victimized 
is  an  open  professional  secret.  A  fairly  good  call 
is  received  ;  it  is  too  good  to  be  declined  unless  a 
better  may  be  reasonably  expected.  It  is  there- 
fore held  for  a  time  under  "advisement."  An  ap- 
pearance of  interest  is  manifested  in  the  church  ; 
but  various  arts  are  employed  to  secure  a  more 
desirable  call.  It  comes  ;  the  first  is  declined  with 
plausible  reasons,  and  the  pastorate  is  entered  upon 
with  the  consciousness  of  having  skillfully  managed 
a  difficult  matter.  But  the  man  who  begins  his 
work  as  a  minister  of  Christ  in  this  spirit  and  by 
the  use  of  these  means,  has  much  yet  to  learn  of  the 
first  "principles  of  the  doctrine  of  Christ," 


312    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

But  even  after  some  men  have  been  long  in  the 
pastorate  they  are  still  in  danger  of  practising  co- 
quetry. It  is  a  matter  both  of  amazement  and 
amusement  that  some  pastors  get  so  many  calls. 
We  are  all  becoming  familiar  with  the  character  of 
the  announcements  which  are  a  part  of  the  general 
proceeding.  It  is  mysteriously  reported  that  a  well- 
known  and  brilliantly  successful  pastor  is  to  receive 
a  call  from  a  large  and  wealthy  church.  In  due 
time  the  call  is  given.  A  few  weeks  of  painful 
suspense  follow  ;  an  expectant  world  awaits  with 
intense  anxiety  the  great  man's  momentous  reply. 
The  newspapers,  having  announced  the  call,  indulge 
in  various  conjectures  as  to  the  probable  answer. 
Two  churches  are  on  the  torture-wheel  of  suspense. 
At  length  the  reply  comes  ;  the  matter  has  been 
carefully  and  prayerfully  considered,  and  the  call 
is  declined.  Letters  to  both  the  churches  are  pub- 
lished ;  the  importance  of  both  in  their  respective 
cities,  to  the  denomination  generally  and  to  the 
cause  of  Christ  at  large,  is  duly  emphasized.  This 
is  a  part  of  the  plan  ;  this  adds  honor  to  the  dis- 
tinguished man  who  has  received  the  call  and  who 
writes  the  letters.  It  is  adroitly  implied  that  should 
the  call  be  accepted  the  interests  of  the  church 
giving  it  would  be  amazingly  and  speedily  advanced  ; 
but  in  that  event  the  very  life  of  the  other  church 
would  be  seriously  imperiled.  What  could  the 
great  man  do  in  such  a  case  but  decline  ?  Who 
can  blame  him?  This  is  the  usual  order  of  events. 
One  church  settles  down  to  its  former  condition  of 


THE    SELECTION    OF    A    CHURCH  313 

possession  ;  the  other  to  its  former  condition  of  in- 
quiry, and  both  with  a  little  less  faith  in  human 
nature  in  general,  and  a  great  deal  less  faith  in 
ministerial  nature  in  particular. 

How  came  the  church  to  extend  the  call  ?  The 
answer  to  that  question  must  not  even  be  remotely 
suggested.  But  in  a  little  time  this  entire  history 
will  be  repeated  in  the  case  of  other  churches.  Still, 
there  is  no  cause  for  serious  alarm  regarding  the 
interests  of  the  church  now  favored  with  the  minis- 
trations of  the  highly  gifted  brother.  He  never 
meant  to  go  ;  he  was  only  coquetting  with  both 
churches  ;  it  was  simply  a  case  of  ministerial  flirta- 
tion. It  takes  some  time  and  much  experience  to 
acquire  this  noble  art  in  its  full  perfection  ;  but  here 
as  elsewhere  patience  and  perseverance  are  sure  to 
result  in  success.  Perhaps  the  affection  of  the  home 
church  has  been  stimulated,  possibly  it  has  been 
chilled ;  but  at  least  an  extensive  denominational 
advertisement  has  been  secured. 

There  is  sometimes  a  practical  and  mercantile 
element  in  these  cases  of  cajolery  and  flirtation.  A 
bit  of  history  will  illustrate  this  point.  Pastor  A 
wished  Pastor  B  to  write  a  letter  recommending 
him  as  a  candidate  for  a  vacant  pastorate.  A  is  a 
considerate  man  ;  he  suggested  the  kind  of  letter 
which  he  wished  to  have  written.  After  recounting 
his  brilliantly  successful  history  in  several  pastor- 
ates, the  letter  was  to  state  that  A  was  of  all  men 
the  man  for  the  place  ;  as  a  preacher  he  could 
draw,  and  as  a  pastor  he  could  hold  those  whom 


314    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

his  eloquence  had  drawn.  It  was  certain  that  with 
his  going  several  family  friends  would  at  once  unite 
with  the  church,  and  in  the  event  of  building  a  new 
church  home  certain  other  family  connections  would 
make  the  raising  of  money  outside  of  the  church  a 
comparatively  easy  matter.  Thus  the  desired  letter 
was  considerately,  if  not  modestly,  outlined.  B  was 
not  a  little  surprised  that  A,  with  his  successful  his- 
tory as  outlined  for  the  proposed  letter,  should  de- 
sire this  call.  The  church  was  not  an  inviting  one ; 
it  had  but  a  small  congregation,  it  needed  a  church 
edifice,  and  it  could  pay  but  a  small  salary.  Sus- 
picion finally  was  aroused,  and  the  question  was 
bluntly  asked,  "  Do  you  really  wish  for  this  call  ? 
Would  you  accept  it  if  it  were  given?"  The  blunt- 
ness  was  startling.  The  reply  came  hesitantly,  "No, 
I  really  would  not ;  the  fact  is,  my  people  have  a 
debt  which  they  are  making  no  efforts  to  raise,  and 
they  are  behind  with  my  salary,  and  if  I  could  get 
this  call  it  would  at  least  strengthen  me  at  home, 
and  would  possibly  stir  up  the  people  to  do  some- 
thing." 

The  letter  asked  for  was  not  written.  The 
brother's  frankness  is  rare  ;  it  is  hoped  and  be- 
lieved that  his  unfairness,  not  to  use  a  harsher 
word,  is  also  rare  among  Christian  ministers.  He 
was  selfishly  coquetting  with  two  churches;  he  was 
trifling  with  sacred  interests ;  he  was  degrading 
himself  and  dishonoring  his  Lord.  No  man  can 
afford  to  lose  his  self-respect.  To  take  this  crown 
from   one's  brow  is   a  painful   humiliation   in   the 


THE    SELECTION    OF    A    CHURCH  315 

sight  of  men,  angels,  and  God.  To  a  true  minister 
the  interests  of  a  church  are  sacred.  No  genuine 
man  will  trifle  with  the  affection,  faith,  or  honor  of 
a  church  of  Christ.  The  church  is  Christ's  noblest 
work,  his  sublime  masterpiece  among  men.  Next 
to  his  birth,  death,  and  resurrection,  and  the  coming 
of  the  Spirit  on  the  day  of  Pentecost,  its  organiza- 
tion was  the  greatest  event  in  the  history  of  that 
wonderful  time.  It  manifests  even  to  angels  the 
many-sided  wisdom  of  God.  The  man  who  injures 
the  church  wounds  her  Lord.  What  are  the  am- 
bitions, failures,  or  successes  of  any  man  compared 
with  the  prosperity  of  the  church  and  the  honor  of 
the  Lord ! 

A  second  suggestion  is.  Do  not  be  afraid  of  a 
hard  field.  Every  field  has  in  it  some  elements  of 
hardness.  In  one  field  it  may  be  the  history  and 
standing  of  the  church  in  that  community ;  in  an- 
other it  may  be  some  headstrong  deacon ;  in  an- 
other a  rule-or-ruin  faction  ;  in  another  it  may  be  a 
heavy  debt ;  in  another  there  may  be,  for  special 
reasons,  an  unusual  degree  of  denominational  op- 
position ;  and  in  still  another  the  church  may  be 
in  a  fearfully  cold  and  dead  spiritual  condition. 
Every  field  is  hard.  Always  and  everywhere  this 
has  been  true ;  always  and  everywhere  this  will 
be  true.  When  a  man  begins  his  work,  empty 
galleries  perhaps  rebuke,  mock,  and  jeer  him. 
They  sadden,  they  madden  him.  Small,  cold 
prayer  meetings  chill  his  soul.  His  field  is  hard. 
Few  fields,  he  thinks,  are  so  hard.      But  in  a  few 


3l6    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

years  he  may  see  the  galleries  filled  with  earnest 
hearers ;  the  prayer  meetings  large  and  warm  ;  con- 
tributions liberal  and  religious ;  and  the  work  of 
his  hand  in  all  directions  prospered.  Is  his  field 
easy  now?  It  never  was  half  so  hard  before. 
Other  elements  of  hardness  have  come  into  his  life 
and  work.  Calls  for  all  sorts  of  work  multiply, 
and  weighty  responsibilities  increase.  To  beat 
one's  own  record  often  taxes  one's  utmost  strength. 

It  is  well  to  remember  that  God  gives  no  good 
things  in  this  life  except  as  the  reward  of  toil. 
Work  and  worth  are  ever  close  neighbors.  We 
may  not  expect  to  escape  the  operation  of  this 
universal  law.  All  God's  servants  have  worked  in 
line  with  this  invariable  principle.  Moses  had  a 
tolerably  hard  field  when  God  said  to  him,  "Come 
now  therefore,  and  I  will  send  thee  unto  Pharaoh, 
that  thou  mayest  bring  forth  my  people  the  chil- 
dren of  Israel  out  of  Egypt."  The  history  of  the 
execution  of  this  command  is  not  suggestive  of  an 
easy  task.  The  call  which  came  out  of  the  midst 
of  the  burning  bush,  contemplated  a  hard  field. 
Moses  had  an  easy  field,  comparatively,  during  his 
forty  years  of  obscurity  in  the  land  of  Midian.  He 
had,  in  one  sense,  an  easy  field  during  his  forty 
years  of  court  life  in  the  Egyptian  metropolis.  But 
the  forty  years  of  wilderness  life  made  him  an  un- 
speakable blessing  to  the  world,  and  gave  him  un- 
dying fame ;  but  for  those  years  we  might  never 
have  heard  his  name. 

Elijah  did  not  have  an  easy  task  when  with  the 


THE    SELECTION    OF    A    CHURCH  317 

suddenness  of  the  lightning's  flash  he  stood  before 
Ahab  and  made  his  dire  declaration.  One  can 
scarcely  call  Cherith,  Zarephath,  Carmel,  or  Horeb 
easy  fields.  It  does  not  seem  to  have  been  the 
purpose  of  God  or  the  desire  of  Elijah  to  find 
such  a  field.  From  this  hard  toil  he  went  up  in 
triumph  to  glory  and  to  God.  From  the  hard 
field  there  was  a  way  leading  to  the  mount  of 
Transfiguration  and  the  companionship  of  Moses 
and  Christ.  Isaiah,  whom  the  apostle  designates 
as  "very  bold,"  and  whom  Dean  Stanley  con- 
siders "one  of  the  grandest  figures  on  the  page  of 
history,"  did  not  escape  the  difficulties  of  a  hard 
field.  The  critics  seem  determined  to  do  now  with 
his  book  what,  according  to  the  tradition,  his  ene- 
mies did  to  his  body.  Jeremiah  had  a  hard  field. 
No  wonder  that  for  a  time  he  held  aloof  from  the 
work  to  which  the  Divine  voice  called  him ;  no 
wonder  that  it  was  difficult  for  him  to  lay  aside  all 
natural  fear  and  trembling.  His  was  a  marvelous 
life  ;  it  is  but  inadequately  appreciated  even  by 
many  intelligent  Bible  readers.  He  was  hated  of 
all  men  for  his  Lord's  sake.  The  priest  Pashur 
smote  him  and  "put  him  into  the  stocks."  Men 
hated  him  as  a  "prophet  of  evil";  "every  one 
cursed  him."  But  he  still  reproved  king,  nobles, 
and  people.  In  the  far-off  future  he  had  the  glori- 
ous vision  of  "  a  righteous  branch  "  of  the  house 
of  David ;  he  saw  the  people  united  under  "  the 
Lord  our  Righteousness."  "  He  endured,  as  see- 
ing him  who  is  invisible;"  this  is  a  possible  and 


3l8    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

a  glorious  sight.  Perhaps  the  tradition  is  true 
which  makes  the  long  tragedy  of  his  life  end  in 
glorious  mart^Tdom.  The  word  of  the  Lord  was 
in  him  as  a  "burning  fire."  It  is  certain  that  Paul 
did  not  have  an  easy  field  in  Philippi,  at  Thessa- 
lonica,  at  Corinth,  at  Rome.  Think  of  Paul  seek- 
ing an  easy  field  ! 

But  time  would  fail  me  to  tell  of  Xavier,  Brain- 
erd,  Carey,  Judson,  and  a  thousand  more,  repre- 
senting various  centuries,  countries,  and  creeds, 
"  Who  through  faith  subdued  kingdoms,  wrought 
righteousness,  obtained  promises,  stopped  the 
mouths  of  lions,  .  .  .  waxed  valiant  in  fight,  turned 
to  flight  the  armies  of  the  aliens."  To  endure 
hardness  as  good  soldiers  of  Jesus  Christ  is  one 
element  in  our  divine  call,  culture,  and  consecra- 
tion. This  spirit  makes  and  reveals  noble  charac- 
ter ;  it  develops  the  grandest  elements  of  manhood  ; 
it  may  also  bring  to  light  the  weakness  which  theo- 
logical seminaries  and  ordaining  councils  failed  to 
discover.  The  furnace  is  a  good  school  for-  God's 
prophets  ;  its  fierce  heat  is  not  an  unmixed  evil. 
Storms  are  good  for  oaks.  The  "  tribulum  "  sepa- 
rates the  grain  from  the  chaff!  A  man  had  better 
not  enter  the  ministry,  or  having  entered  it  he  had 
better  leave  it,  if  he  is  not  willing  to  endure  hard- 
ness whereof  all  noble  workers  are  partakers. 
Difficulties  vanish  before  the  presence  of  a  man 
whose  soul  is  constrained  by  the  love  of  Christ. 
Toil  to  such  a  man  is  joy.  Work  is  a  divine  bless- 
ing;.     Christ's    true    soldiers    welcome    the    fierce 


THE    SELECTION    OF    A    CHURCH  319 

battle.  Such  a  contest  glorifies  his  Lord.  In  this 
spirit  the  true  workman  enters  the  hard  field,  and 
soon  the  thorn  shall  be  supplanted  by  the  fir  tree, 
and  the  brier  by  the  myrtle  tree  ;  "  and  it  shall  be 
to  the  Lord  for  a  name,  for  an  everlasting  sign 
that  shall  not  be  cut  off." 

A  third  suggestion  is,  Do  not  hesitate  to  go 
where  God  manifestly  leads.  The  Christian,  and 
especially  the  Christian  minister,  is  a  man  dead  to 
himself  and  to  the  world,  but  alive  unto  Christ. 
He  has  no  self  life ;  his  life  is  hid  with  Christ  in 
God.  When  he  became  a  Christian  self  was  ut- 
terly and  forever  dethroned,  and  Christ  was  com- 
pletely and  forever  enthroned.  He  is  crucified  to 
the  world  and  its  vain  ambitions.  This  is  implied 
in  his  reception  of  Christ ;  this  is  emphasized  in 
the  beautiful  and  significant  ordinance  of  baptism. 
What  Loyola  was  to  his  obedient  followers  that 
and  more  Christ  is  to  be  to  all  his  people.  What 
the  followers  of  St.  Francis  were  to  him  as  their 
absolutely  authoritative  leader,  that  and  more  are 
all  Christ's  followers  to  be  to  him.  His  word  is 
their  supreme  law  ;  the  whispers  of  his  will  are 
more  authoritative  to  them  than  the  thunders  of 
merely  human  speech. 

Theirs  not  to  make  reply, 
Theirs  not  to  reason  why, 
Theirs  but  to  do  and  die. 

To  no  man  would  we  render  unquestioning  obe- 
dience ;  such  assumption  of  authority  on  his  part 


320    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

we  would  utterly  and  scornfully  repudiate.  To 
Christ,  on  the  contrary,  we  should  render  nothing 
else  ;  such  assumption  on  his  part  is  not  assump- 
tion. It  is  his  right  to  command  ;  it  is  our  glor^^ 
to  obey.  Absolute  surrender  to  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
sublimity  of  manhood.  We  need  more  of  it.  A 
man  is  never  so  lofty  as  when  he  is  thus  lowly  at 
Jesus'  feet.  Even  comparatively  impure  faiths  have 
had  their  heroes  and  martyrs.  The  spirit  of  devo- 
tion to  the  Church  of  Rome  gives  us  a  haloed  his- 
tory of  the  establishment  of  that  church  in  North 
America.  That  church  has  in  this  historic  connec- 
tion a  long  -line  of  heroes,  saints,  and  martyrs. 
The  founding  of  the  city  of  Montreal  by  Maison- 
neuve,  in  May,  1642,  is  romantic  as  a  dream  and 
heroic  as  any  battlefield.  This  Christian  knight 
declared  that  it  was  alike  his  duty  and  his  honor 
to  found  a  colony  in  Montreal,  and  that  he  would 
go  if  every  tree  were  an  Iroquois.  In  some  of  these 
brave  missionaries  highest  culture  and  deepest  con- 
secration sweetly  blended.  No  country,  no  faith 
has  witnessed  more  consecrated  and  untiring  zeal. 
Men  of  noble  blood  and  refined  culture  were  will- 
ing to  live  in  the  blinding  smoke,  the  bitter  cold, 
the  dense  ignorance,  and  the  abominable  cruelties 
of  the  Indian  wigwams,  in  order  to  teach  these 
savages  the  truths  of  Christianity.  Near  a  spot 
which  the  writer  knows  well,  one  of  these  conse- 
crated men  kept  life  within  his  emaciated  body  in 
his  tent  by  hugging  a  dog  during  the  nights  of  a 
terrible    Canadian    winter.       No    history   tells    of 


THE    SELECTION    OF    A    CHURCH  321 

greater  sacrifices.  The  story  as  told  by  Parkman, 
in. "The  Jesuits  of  North  America,"  thrills  the 
heart  to-day.  The  blood  of  these  princely  men 
dyed  that  Canadian  soil ;  that  blood  was  the  seed 
of  their  church  No  story  of  missionary  zeal,  ex- 
cept it  be  that  of  Xavier,  can  surpass  that  of  the 
brave  Breboeuf  and  the  heroic  Lalemant,  who  were 
sent  to  the  Huron  Mission  and  were  captured  and 
tortured  by  Iroquois  Indians  in  the  most  horrible 
manner,  too  horrible  to  be  fully  described,  till 
death  came  to  their  relief 

In  all  the  world  to-day  the  pope  has  no  such 
obedient  children  as  these  French  Canadians  ;  they 
show  a  love  and  loyalty  worthy  of  a  purer  faith 
and  more  Christly  church.  It  must  be  admitted 
that  the  standards  of  the  Church  of  Rome  were 
planted  in  that  inhospitable  soil  by  as  brave  and 
consecrated  men  as  ever  went  out  to  evangelize  the 
world.  The  shores  of  Lake  Michigan  were  trodden 
by  men  of  like  spirit.  Those  shores  are  still  voice- 
ful  with  the  echoes  of  Father  Marquette's  words 
and  deeds.  He  still  lives,  not  only  in  material 
monuments,  but  also  in  the  Christian  profession  of 
many  a  red  son  of  the  forest.  The  church  which 
is  blessed  with  such  sons  shall  win  the  victories  of 
missionary  zeal  in  every  land.  If  these  men  did 
this  for  Mary,  what  ought  we  to  do  for  Mary's  Son 
and  Lord  ?  With  a  purer  faith  we  ought  to  have 
a  more  fervent  zeal.  The  errors  of  these  teachers 
were  numerous  and  deadly  ;  the  fruits  of  these  er- 
rors are  still  sadly  seen  in  many  ways  in   Eastern 


322    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Canada  ;  but  their  devotion  to  duty,  as  they  under- 
stood it,  was  simply  sublime.  They  hesitated  not 
to  go  where  they  believed  God  manifestly  led  them  ; 
no  danger  deterred  them,  no  suffering  lessened  the 
fervor  of  their  flaming  zeal.  Men  with  such  zeal 
in  their  lives  and  with  the  pure  gospel  of  Christ  on 
their  lips,  the  world  needs  to-day ;  many  such 
would  soon  bring  the  world  to  its  Lord's  feet.  To 
send  out  such  the  churches  and  schools  should 
constantly  labor  and  pray. 

If  a  man  is  sure  that  he  is  led  by  the  Spirit  of 
God  to  a  particular  field,  he  can  endure  anything 
in  that  field.  If  he  is  there  by  manipulations  and 
artifices  of  his  own,  he  is  stripped  of  all  power. 
He  is  a  soldier  in  battle  without  helmet,  sword,  or 
shield.  Why  should  a  man  wish  to  go  where  God 
does  not  lead  ?  He  can  have  no  joy,  no  peace,  no 
success.  Going  where  God  leads  he  will  have  all 
which  God  sees  best  to  give.  He  will  have  at  least 
self-respect ;  he  will  have  also  God.  Anywhere 
with  God  is  success,  is  heaven.  The  arts  some- 
times practised  to  secure  calls  are  as  unwise  from 
a  worldly  point  of  view,  as  they  are  unchristian  from 
a  religious  point  of  view.  No  greater  unkindness 
can  be  done  to  a  man  than  to  push  him  by  the  in- 
fluence of  friends  and  the  tricks  of  the  politician 
into  a  place  for  which  he  is  manifestly  unfit.  The 
higher  he  is  lifted  the  more  conspicuous  does  his 
unfitness  become.  The  men  who  during  our  war 
were  pushed  into  high  places  in  army  and  navy  by 
political  and  social  influences,  soon  went  down  al- 


THE   SELECTION    OF    A    CHURCH  323 

most  out  of  sight.  The  men  who  went  up  because 
they  had  abiHty  to  go,  are  still  up  in  honorable 
office  or  in  immortal  history. 

Can  a  man  know  that  in  the  selection  of  his 
church  he  is  led  by  the  Spirit  of  God  ?  Only  as 
he  is  thus  led  can  he  know  that  he  is  a  child  of 
God.  God  will  never  leave  long  in  the  dark  an 
honest  inquirer  for  light  and  duty.  A  man  must 
first  carefully  question  his  motives.  If  the  response 
from  the  bottom  of  his  soul  is  that  he  desires  simply 
to  know  God's  will,  that  knowledge  will  soon  come. 
God  may  not  wish  any  church  to  call  him.  God 
may  desire  him  to  go  out  and  call  a  church  ;  for 
this  procedure  he  will  have  abundant  apostolic 
precedent.  What  would  the  apostles  have  accom- 
plished had  they  waited  to  be  called  ?  What 
would  missionaries  do  to-day  if  they  waited  for  a 
call  from  a  church? 

Then,  again,  there  must  be  a  careful  study,  in 
the  light  of  sanctified  common  sense,  of  all  the 
providential  leadings.  God  often  answers  the 
prayer  for  wisdom  by  shutting  up  all  doors  but 
one  ;  that  open  door  is  his  voice,  saying,  "This  is 
the  way,  walk  ye  in  it."  There  may  be,  still  again, 
impressions  of  duty  in  certain  directions,  whose 
origin  we  cannot  trace,  but  whose  promptings  we 
should  obey.  If  our  motives  are  pure,  if  God's 
guidance  has  been  earnestly  sought,  and  if  God's 
providences  have  been  unselfishly  studied,  then  we 
may  be  sure  that  these  promptings  are  from  God. 
The  man  will  never  go  astray  whose  life  is  guided 


324    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

by  this  universal  and  eternal  law,  formulated  and 
exemplified  by  Jesus  Christ,  a  law  which  every 
Christian  minister  should  take  as  the  rule  of  his 
life:  "Whosoever  will  save  his  life  shall  lose  it; 
and  whosoever  will  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  shall 
find  it." 


XIV 
THE  CHRISTIAN  YEAR^ 

IN  this  discussion  of  the  Christian  year  it  is  ad- 
mitted, at  the  outset,  that  neither  in  the  New 
Testament,  nor  in  the  earHest  Christian  hterature, 
are  there  commands  for  or  intimations  of  the  ob- 
servance of  such  a  division  of  time  as  we  now 
understand  by  the  Christian  or  Church  year.  There 
is  clear  evidence  that  in  the  second  century  there 
was  a  general  observance  of  Easter  and  Pentecost ; 
but  not  until  after  the  fourth  century  did  the  Chris- 
tian year,  with  its  cycle  of  annual  festivals,  come 
before  us  in  its  chief  outlines ;  and  not  until  a 
much  later  period  do  we  find  it  in  its  present  form. 
During  this  earlier  period  there  are  no  suggestions 
of  a  departure  from  the  methods  of  reckoning  time 
which  were  observed  by  all  the  subjects  of  the 
Roman  Empire.  Throughout  this  paper  this  ad- 
mission will  be  made,  and  no  effort  to  found  the 
obsen^ance  upon  the  clear  teachings  of  the  Scrip- 
ture will  be  attempted.  This  paper  endorses  the 
observance  of  a  modified  form  of  the  Christian  year. 
Several  reasons  lead  to  this  endorsement,  and  your 
attention  is  now  invited  to  their  consideration. 
I    The  first  reason  is  found  in  a  consideration  of 

1  Delivered  at  the  tenth  Baptist  Congress,  held  in  Philadelphia, 
May  25,  1892. 

325 


326    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

what  the  Christian  year  is.  Its  chief  pecuharity  is, 
as  Dr.  Schaff  has  well  said,  "that  it  centers  in  the 
person  and  work  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  is  intended  to 
minister  to  his  glory."  The  first  impulse  toward 
the  Church  year  was  given  by  the  observance  of 
the  anniversaries  of  the  great  events  in  his  life. 
The  earliest  facts  in  that  life  to  be  commemorated 
were  naturally  his  death  and  resurrection.  Then 
followed,  at  a  considerable  distance,  the  observance 
of  the  supposed  anniversary  of  his  birth  ;  then,  in 
their  order,  that  of  his  ascension  and  the  outpour- 
ing of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Later  each  of  these  great 
feasts  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  center  of  a  cycle  ; 
and,  in  due  time,  these  cycles  were  so  extended  as 
to  commemorate  almost  everything  of  great  im- 
portance in  the  life  of  the  Lord.  The  true  idea  of 
the  Christian  year  is  that  which  regards  it  as  a 
yearly  representation  of  the  most  memorable  in- 
cidents in  the  life  of  the  Lord.  It  is  thus  seen 
to  be  an  annual  Confession  of  Faith,  each  part  of 
the  year  witnessing  to  some  great  article  in  that 
Confession.  It  kept,  and  is  designed  always  to 
keep,  before  the  minds  alike  of  devout  believers 
and  of  worldly  observers,  the  chief  facts  in  the  his- 
tory of  redemption.  It  is  an  illustrated  edition  of 
the  gospel  history.  There  surely  can  be  no  objec- 
tion to  the  emphasis  thus  given  to  the  leading 
chapters  in  that  divine-human  life.  Many  men  will 
not  learn  this  story  even  after  all  the  attempts  made 
to  teach  it,  alike  by  those  who  observe  and  those 
who  discard  the  Christian  year.      Ten  men  read  the 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  32/ 

story  of  Christianity  as  it  is  exhibited  in  the  Hves 
of  professed  Christians  for  every  one  who  reads  it 
as  it  is  recorded  in  the  inspired  Gospels.  Every 
Christian  should  incarnate  in  his  own  character  the 
teachings  and  example  of  the  Lord.  Every  church 
should,  in  like  manner,  by  special  observance  em- 
phasize the  teaching  and  example  of  Christ  as  they 
are  set  forth  in  the  New  Testament,  and  ten  men 
will  learn  the  significance  of  these  events  as  they 
are  emphasized  by  church  observances  for  every 
one  who  would  learn  them  if  he  were  limited  to  the 
gospel  story.  If  then,  we  keep  in  mind  the  real 
meaning  of  the  Christian  year  we  shall  find  in  that 
itself  a  strong  argument  in  favor  of  its  observance. 

2.  A  second  argument  is  found  in  the  natural- 
ness, and  even  inevitableness,  of  the  growth  of  the 
Christian  year.  This  growth  has  a  three-fold  origin, 
(i)  It  is  due  partly  to  the  influence  of  the  Jewish 
ecclesiastical  year  upon  the  minds  of  the  early 
Christians.  It  was  impossible  that  the  Jewish  sacred 
year  should  not  have  produced  a  profound  influence 
in  the  development  of  the  Christian  cultus.  The 
whole  Jewish  year  was  symbolical  and  typical  ;  if 
we  forget  that  fact  we  lose  much  of  its  significance. 
The  Sabbath  was  commemorative  and  prophetic  ; 
it  looked  back  to  creation,  it  looked  forward  to  re- 
demption. The  Passover,  with  its  lamb  and  all  its 
appointments,  foretold  the  coming  of  the  Lamb  of 
God,  and  found  its  full  fruitage  in  his  resurrection. 
The  Passover  was  the  root  and  stalk  of  the  truth  of 
which  Easter  is  the  flower  and  the  fruit.     The  Jew- 


328    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

ish  feast  of  Harvest  ripened  into  the  Christian  Pen- 
tecost. The  Christian  feasts  give  us  the  true  meaning 
of  those  Jewish  festivals.  (2)  Heathen  festivals  had 
their  influence  also  in  the  development  of  these  Chris- 
tian feasts.  This  is  frankly  admitted.  No  doubt 
they  are  right  who  say  that  Christmas  is  but  the 
transformation  of  a  heathen  festival.  The  Christians, 
with  a  worldly  wisdom  which  all  will  not  endorse, 
strove  to  transform  and  exalt  the  heathen  festivals 
with  which  they  were  unavoidably  brought  into 
contact  in  business  and  social  life.  But  it  must  be 
borne  in  mind  that  even  these  festivals  had  a  deeper 
meaning  than  perhaps  either  heathen  or  Christians 
fully  knew.  They  are  founded  upon  the  sublime 
truths  which  God  is  constantly  teaching  us  in  his 
great  book  of  nature.  The  heathen  festival  which 
Christmas  transformed,  suggests  Christ  as  the  Sun 
of  .Righteousness  for  the  illumination  of  the  world. 
These  heathen  festivals,  as  has  been  often  pointed 
out,  were  unconscious  prophecies  of  Christian 
truths.  The  psalmist  long  ago  sang,  "  Day  unto 
day  uttereth  speech,  and  night  unto  night  showeth 
knowledge."  The  whole  earth  is  voiceful  with 
truths  regarding  God,  if  men  will  but  listen  ;  the 
panorama  of  the  seasons  is  resplendent  with  the 
glory  of  the  Sun  of  Righteousness,  if  men  will  but 
look. 

Many  writers  have  dwelt  upon  the  fact  that  there 
is  thus  a  mysterious  correspondence  between  the 
seasons  and  the  observance  of  the  Church  year. 
Christmas  emphasizes  the  coming  of  Christ  into  a 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  329 

lost  ^vorld,  in  winter  time  when  nature  appears  to 
be  lifeless.  Easter  reminds  us  of  the  resurrection 
of  all  nature  to  life  and  power  ;  and  Pentecost  is 
illustrative  of  the  summer  when  nature  is  in  bloom. 
It  is  admitted,  indeed,  that  this  correspondence 
possesses  its  chief  significance  in  northern  climes  ; 
nevertheless  there  are  here  suggestions  worthy  of 
our  constant  consideration.  Similar  tendencies  are 
seen  in  our  own  day.  Converted  Chinese  are  anxious 
to  introduce  Christian  ideas  into  Chinese  observ- 
ances. How  shall  they  observe  the  Chinese  New 
Year?  In  several  instances  they  have  transformed 
that  festival  into  an  occasion  for  the  declaration  of 
Christian  truth.  They  have  kept  the  heathen  date, 
but  have  baptized  the  heathen  observance  into  an 
atmosphere  of  Christian  truth.  He  would  be  a 
bold  man  who  would  rebuke  the  early  Christians 
for  doing  in  their  day  what  we  endorse  converted 
heathen  for  doing  in  our  own  day.  He  is  a  very 
inconsistent  man  who  is  opposed  to  the  Christian 
element  in  these  baptized  heathen  festivals,  while 
he  freely  endorses  the  heathen  elements  which  still 
remain.  Many  a  man  freely  allows  his  children  to 
"knock  eggs"  at  Easter-tide,  and  to  indulge  in 
other  heathen  elements  of  the  season,  but  who 
sharply  rebukes  his  children  for  giving  a  Christian 
significance  to  that  joyous  feast.  Many  a  man  will 
allow  the  erection  of  trees  in  his  home  and  the 
burning  of  tapers  in  the  branches  of  those  trees  at 
the  Christmas-tide,  although  this  custom  is  pure  hea- 
thenism, who  would  think  his  family  were  going  to 


330    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Rome  or  further  if  they  attended  a  service  in  God's 
house  on  Christmas  Day.  Such  a  man  will  boldly 
observe  the  heathen  remnants  of  those  old  heathen 
festivals,  while  he  vigorously  repudiates  the  Chris- 
tian elements  for  which  alone  these  festivals  are 
worthy  of  our  approval. 

In  a  town  to  which  this  writer's  attention  was 
recently  called,  there  was  a  few  years  ago  a  great 
beer  garden.  An  earnest  preacher  visited  that 
town  and  held  meetings  near  the  garden  ;  many 
were  converted  and  a  church  was  organized  which 
was  called  "The  Garden  Church."  Did  he  do 
right  in  so  naming  it  ?  Or  was  he  guilty  of  a  fool- 
ish submission  to  the  world  and  the  devil  ?  Who 
will  so  charge  him  ?  It  is  a  thousand  pities  that  we 
cannot  be  governed  in  our  church  life  by  sanctified 
common  sense  and  not  by  reasonless  prejudice. 

(3)  The  desire  to  commemorate  the  anniversaries 
of  important  events  in  the  life  of  Christ,  as  has 
already  been  suggested,  also  had  its  influence  in 
the  development  of  the  Church  year.  The  history 
of  every  religious  and  national  organization  illus- 
trates the  tendency  to  this  annual  emphasis.  We 
are  soon  to  commemorate  great  events  in  the  life 
of  Carey  and  in  the  establishment  of  Baptist  Foreign 
Missions.  We  are  constantly  multiplying  commem- 
orative occasions  in  the  history  of  the  republic.  A 
few  years  ago  our  holidays  were  few;  soon  they  will 
be  very  numerous.  Already  there  is  discussion  of 
the  duty  of  making  the  birthdays  of  the  unique 
Columbus,  the  immortal  Lincoln,  and  the  illustrious 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  33  I 

Grant,  holidays.  The  seventieth  birthday  of  the 
great  general  was  made  this  year  a  half-holiday  in 
the  city  of  New  York.  It  was  simply  inevitable 
that  with  the  development  of  the  history  of  the 
church  the  anniversaiy  of  leading  events  in  Christ's 
life  should  be  recognized.  The  original  idea  was 
eminently  praiseworthy.  It  served  to  keep  these 
events  constantly  before  the  mind  of  the  people  ;  it 
aimed  to  intermingle  the  facts  of  our  Lord's  life 
with  the  daily  experiences  of  the  common  people, 
and  to  call  attention  to  the  great  facts  on  which  our 
salvation  depends. 

Unfortunately,  with  the  introduction  of  other 
errors  these  days  came  to  be  unduly  multiplied. 
When  the  worship  of  the  Virgin  Mary  was  intro- 
duced, then  came  days  commemorating  events  in 
her  life ;  then  came  the  commemoration  of  the 
death  days,  or  as  they  were  poetically  called,  "  the 
heavenly  birthdays  "  of  apostles,  martyrs,  and  saints. 
The  idea  soon  arose  that  within  the  circle  of  the 
civil  year  all  the  great  events,  from  the  first  an- 
nouncement of  the  Lord's  birth  to  the  death  of  the 
last  saint,  should  be  celebrated.  It  is  said  that  the 
Nestorians  were  the  first  to  suggest  that  the  Church 
year  begin  with  the  first  Sunday  in  Advent.  Soon 
the  octave  followed  the  observance  of  the  great 
festivals  such  as  Christmas,  Easter,  Pentecost,  and 
others.  It  thus  came  to  pass  that  the  Church  year, 
which  began  in  simplicity,  was  gradually  overloaded, 
that  superstition  and  idleness  increased,  that  the 
Sabbath  was  to  some  degree  superseded,  and  that 


332    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

the  work  of  Christ  was  held  in  less  esteem  than  the 
patronage  of  saints.  Even  as  early  as  the  Nicene 
age  these  feasts  connected  with  Mary  and  the 
martyrs  were  crowded  into  the  church  calendar. 
In  the  Greek  Church  at  this  hour  there  are  to  de- 
vout worshipers  only  one  hundred  and  thirty  work- 
ing days  in  the  year.  This  undue  development  is 
one  of  the  dangerous  tendencies  of  the  system  ;  but 
a  similar  remark  will  apply  to  all  the  command- 
ments of  God  and  to  all  the  apostolic  observances 
in  the  church.  The  Lord's  baptism  and  the  Lord's 
Supper  have  been  so  misunderstood  as  to  destroy 
their  true  significance,  and  to  make  the  word  of 
God  of  non  effect.  We  must  at  every  point  in 
church  life  distinguish  between  the  use  and  abuse 
of  that  which  is  commanded  by  divine  authority, 
and  also  of  that  which  is  permitted  in  the  exercise 
of  Christian  liberty. 

3.  A  third  reason  in  favor  of  these  observances 
is  found  in  the  fact  that  they  conduce  to  the  pre- 
sentation of  the  truth  in  its  entirety.  Truth  is  a 
sphere  and  not  an  arc.  We  are  all  in  danger  of 
presenting  truth  as  a  segment,  rather  than  as  a 
circle.  We  should  constantly  strive  to  present  it 
in  its  sphericity  ;  but  too  often,  at  best,  the  truth  is 
presented  as  a  spheroid  rather  than  as  a  sphere. 
We  are  all  in  danger  of  riding  some  sort  of  a  hobby, 
which  soon  rides  us. 

It  must  be  admitted  that  one  advantage  secured 
by  a  reasonable  observance  of  the  Church  year  is 
the   presentation  of  truth  more  nearly  in  its  due 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  333 

proportions  ;  thus  avoiding  the  danger  of  giving 
almost  exclusive  prominence  to  our  own  favorite 
fragments  of  the  gospel,  and  helping  to  its  presenta- 
tion with  symmetry  and  beauty.  One  man  is 
carried  away  by  the  idea  of  Christian  perfection  ; 
another  by  the  second  coming  of  Christ ;  another 
by  some  other  doctrine  of  greater  or  less  impor- 
tance. These  men  hold  a  few  truths  so  conspicu- 
ously before  their  eyes  that  they  are  blind  to  many 
other  great  and  perhaps  more  important  truths  of 
the  Bible.  In  some  churches  some  doctrines  are 
almost  never  heard,  while  others  are  heard  with  a 
painful  monotony  and  a  reprehensible  repetition. 
Surely  no  one  will  deny  that  the  doctrine  of  the 
resurrection  ought  to  be  presented  in  every  con- 
gregation at  least  once  a  year,  and  surely  no  one 
will  affirm  that  there  is  a  more  appropriate  time 
for  its  presentation  than  the  Easter-tide.  Then 
earth  and  sky  combine  to  emphasize  the  truth  of 
that  great  doctrine.  At  that  season  its  sublime 
truths  are  in  the  heart  of  the  great  majority  in  every 
community.  It  would  be  worse  than  folly  not  to 
take  advantage  of  the  presence  of  these  thoughts 
for  the  declaration  of  this  glorious  doctrine.  The 
observance  is  here  ;  it  will  remain. 

A  man  might  as  well  "whistle  down  the  wind" 
or  "  bay  the  moon  "  as  attempt  to  prevent  the  ob- 
servance of  these  customs.  The  question  really  is 
not,  Shall  we  have  a  Church  year?  It  is,  Shall  we 
have  the  best  possible  Church  year  !  A  recent 
article  in  the   "Watchman"  calls  attention  to  the 


334    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

fact  that  many  of  our  churches  are  rapidly  coming 
to  have  a  Church  year  of  a  very  undesirable  kind, 
to  some  degree  of  an  unchristian  kind.  The  first 
Sunday  in  January  is  Evangelical  Alliance  Day. 
The  first  week  in  January  is  a  sort  of  non-Episcopal 
Lent.  Then  come  Home  Mission  day,  Foreign 
Mission  day,  Bible  and  Publication  day.  Children's 
day.  Theological  Seminary  day.  Chapel  day,  Bible 
day.  Prison  day,  Labor  day.  College  day.  Grand 
Army  day,  Y.  M.  C.  A.  day.  Temperance  day, 
Education  day,  Public  Schools  day,  Mohonk  Con- 
ference day,  Freedman's  day,  Christian  Endeavor 
day,  and  half  a  dozen  more  days.  Ever>^  pastor  is 
besieged  to  introduce  new  topics  for  pulpit  discus- 
sion and  for  the  offerings  of  God's  people  until  he 
is  driven  almost  to  the  verge  of  insanity.  If  he 
were  to  respond  to  all  the  calls  he  would  need  to 
add  a  few  Sundays  to  the  year  in  order  to  com- 
plete the  list. 

In  our  Sunday-schools  also  we  are  following  the 
same  tendency.  One  Sunday  is  practically  Peter's 
day,  another  is  John's,  another  is  Paul's,  another  is 
David's,  another  is  Romans'  day,  another  is  Cor- 
inthians' day,  another  is  the  Twenty-third  Psalm 
day,  another  is  Parable  day,  etc.,  etc.,  ad  infinitum. 
If  we  are  to  have  a  Church  year,  that  which  is  ob- 
served by  Episcopalians,  Lutherans,  and  Moravians 
is  certainly  preferable  to  that  which  has  now  been 
outlined.  The  topics  contemplated  for  that  year 
are  drawn  directly  from  the  gospel ;  they  are  such 
great  themes  as  the  incarnation,  the  resurrection, 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  335 

the  descent  of  the  Spirit,  the  Trinity,  and  similar 
great  doctrines.  We  are  obliged  with  great  earnest- 
ness to  resist  the  desire  of  Boards  and  committees 
to  give  a  day  to  their  special  work,  however  im- 
portant it  may  be  in  itself  In  this  regard,  as  in 
the  case  of  the  festivals  of  the  church,  as  they  are 
now  observed,  we  are  to  choose  some  and  reject 
others.  No  man  who  favors  the  adoption  of  this 
modern  church  calendar  can  with  consistency  oppose 
the  observance  of  a  more  reasonable,  more  histor- 
ical, and  more  scriptural  church  calendar  such  as 
this  paper  approves. 

4.  A  fourth  reason  for  the  observance  of  a  modi- 
fied Church  year  is  that  it  brings  out  into  strong 
relief  the  historic  side  of  Christianity.  Christianity 
is  now,  and  it  always  has  been,  attacked  vigorously 
on  its  historic  side.  A  wisely  designed  church 
calendar  gives  great  prominence  to  the  essential 
facts  of  Christian  life  and  history.  The  Church 
year,  with  its  most  commendable  cycles,  antedated 
the  present  divisions  of  the  church  into  Protestant 
and  Roman,  and  so  antedated  the  corruptions  of 
the  papal  system.  It  was  that  abominable  system 
which  introduced  the  dangerous  multiplication  of 
these  days.  The  papacy  is  a  strange  mingling  of 
Paganism  and  Judaism.  Romanism  is  a  baptized 
mongrelism  of  the  same  ;  and  it  was  a  Roman  bap- 
tism— a  mere  sprinkling.  In  observing  a  reason- 
able Church  year  we  are  lifting  up  our  voice 
against  the  additions  of  the  papacy  to  the  simplicit>' 
of  the  earlier  practices.     These  observances  are  a 


336    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

constant  protest  against  historic  infidelity.  They 
unite  us  with  the  eadier  centuries  in  a  true  fellow- 
ship, and  in  primitive  evangelical  simplicity.  By 
rejecting  all  such  observances  we  practically  submit 
to  papal  Mariolatry  and  Hagiolatry,  allowing  them 
to  rob  us  of  our  privileges  ;  by  observing  these 
feasts  in  their  fewness  and  simplicity,  as  they  were 
observed  in  the  early  centuries  before  Romanism 
multipHed  and  degraded  them,  we  declare  our  in- 
dependence of  papalism  and  our  loyalty  to  an 
evangelical  and  primitive  simplicity. 

In  this  respect  these  observances  stand  to  the 
historic  reality  and  authority  of  the  church,  as  the 
Fourth  of  July,  the  Twenty-second  of  February,  and 
other  great  days,  stand  to  the  reality,  authority,  and 
development  of  the  American  Republic.  They  are 
to  some  degree  monumental,  as  is  the  Lord's  Sup- 
per. So  long  as  Christmas  and  Easter  are  observed, 
two  gigantic  witnesses  to  the  fundamental  facts  in 
our  Lord's  life  will  continue  to  give  unimpeach- 
able testimony.  In  this  respect  we  do  well  to  em- 
phasize these  great  feasts.  It  must  be  admitted  that 
where  these  more  modern  yearly  feasts,  so  painfully 
multiplied  by  Romanism,  are  most  constantly  ob- 
served, the  Sabbath  is  to  some  degree  neglected  ; 
but  the  more  general  observance  of  the  earliest,  the 
simple,  the  great  festivals  recently  in  the  United 
States  has  not  interfered  with  the  observance  of  the 
Lord's  Day.  We  have  introduced  many  feasts  into 
our  American  life,  feasts  that  are  purely  national. 
In  some  parts  of  New  England  there  are  days  of 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  337 

fasting  and  prayer,  and  our  annual  Thanksgiving 
Day,  originating  in  New  England,  has  now  been 
adopted  in  nearly  all  parts  of  the  Union,  and  has 
become  practically  a  national  institution  ;  and  as 
the  nation  grows  older,  other  holidays  will  be  added. 
But  no  one  will  claim  that  the  observance  of  Thanks- 
giving Day  and  similar  days  has  interfered  with  the 
reverence  which  we  pay  to  the  Lord's  Day.  Neither 
will  any  one  affirm  that  the  observance  of  Good 
Friday  would  create  less  regard  for  the  Lord's  Day. 
Christmas  and  Easter  are  now  kept  by  very  many 
of  our  most  devoted  church  people  in  the  United 
States  ;  and  without  doubt  Good  Friday  and  Pente- 
cost will  soon  come  to  be  observed  with  equal 
generality.  Many  denominations  have  united  in 
union  services  on  Good  Friday  in  New  York  and 
in  other  cities,  and  the  result  has  fully  justified  the 
practice.  Good  Friday  has  been  made  an  occasion 
of  general  humiliation  and  prayer,  and  also  of  med- 
itation upon  the  atoning  death  of  the  Lord  and 
Saviour.  From  personal  experience  your  speaker 
can  testify  to  the  great  value  of  calling  attention  on 
Good  Friday  evening  to  the  history  of  our  Lord's 
suffering  in  the  garden,  and  his  death  upon  the 
cross.  The  consideration  of  the  events  which  that 
day  sets  forth  at  nine  in  the  morning,  at  twelve 
o'clock  noon,  and  at  three  in  the  afternoon,  has 
made  the  weekly  prayer  meeting  on  that  evening 
more  solemn  and  blessed  than  any  meeting  of  the 
year.  We  thus  emphasize  the  privilege  of  all  God's 
people  to  enjoy  the  inheritance  which   has  come 

w 


338    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

from  the  early  days  of  Christianity ;  an  inheritance 
of  which  we  should  not  allow  ourselves  to  be 
robbed  by  the  vagaries  and  idolatries  of  the  Roman 
Church. 

5.  Another  reason  which  may  be  named  for  fa- 
voring a  modified  observance  of  the  Church  year,  is 
the  influence  of  such  an  observance  upon  true  Chris- 
tian union.  This  paper  has  no  sympathy  with  the 
attempts  to  secure  organic  Christian  union  ;  such 
union  will  never  come,  and  if  it  did,  as  things  now 
are,  it  would  not  be  a  blessing.  If  it  ever  comes  it 
will  begin  at  the  baptistery,  for  all  denominations 
accept  the  catholic  rite  of  baptism.  There  are 
bodies  organically  united  who  in  the  essentials  of 
faith  are  widely  separated.  There  are  denomina- 
tions whose  different  wings  have  less  in  common 
spiritually  than  have  other  bodies  bearing  different 
denominational  names.  We  need  a  union  in  spirit 
rather  than  in  form,  an  essential  rather  than  an 
organic  union.  The  observance  of  Christmas  and 
Easter  tends  to  such  a  unity.  Differing  consti- 
tutionally, educationally,  and  radically  in  every  way 
from  the  Roman  Church,  your  speaker  joyfully  con- 
fesses to  some  sense  of  unity  in  the  common  ob- 
servance of  the  great  feasts — not  the  saints'  days, 
often  of  very  unsaintly  sinners,  nor  other  unwar- 
ranted additions  to  the  primitive  feasts — but  the 
great  and  ancient  feasts  of  the  church  universal. 
All  bodies  of  Christians  may  commemorate  the 
birth,  death,  and  resurrection  of  Jesus  Christ  and 
the  descent  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  339 

Because  we  endorse  the  Christmas  and  the  Easter 
and  the  Pentecost  cycles,  we  are  not  obliged  to 
endorse  Mariolatry  and  Hagiolatry.  We  have  no 
right  to  allow  our  protest  against  Romanism  to  rob 
us  of  the  inheritance  which  belongs  to  us  as  Bap- 
tists. It  has  been  said  that  "  Romanists  are  Papists 
and  Episcopalians  are  Apists."  Thank  God,  we 
Baptists  are  neither.  We  are  older  than  either  of 
these  churches.  Baptists  belong,  without  a  particle 
of  doubt,  to  the  catholic  and  apostolic  church. 
Sprinkling  and  pouring  are  historically  and  literally 
ordinances  of  sects  ;  baptism  is  the  true  catholic 
and  apostolic  ordinance.  Let  us,  who  are  the 
modern  representatives  of  the  primitive  and  apos- 
tolic church,  not  be  robbed  of  our  rights  because 
of  the  abuse  of  these  feasts  by  Roman  and  other 
bodies.  If  any  ecclesiastical  authority  were  to  insist 
upon  these  observances,  observances  which  are  not 
distinctly  commanded  in  the  word  of  God,  we  should 
resist  that  assumption.  On  the  other  hand,  if  any 
ecclesiastical  authority  were  to  forbid  our  judicious 
observance  of  these  days,  again  we  should  resist 
such  an  assumption.  Let  every  man  enjoy  his 
liberty  in  this  respect ;  let  no  man  unfairly  criticise 
his  brother ;  let  every  man  be  fully  persuaded  in 
his  own  mind  and  so  let  him  act.  Dr.  Schaff  shows 
that  even  such  eminent  teachers  in  the  early  church 
as  Chrysostom  and  Augustine  emphasize  the  fact 
that  the  observance  of  these  Christian  feasts  was 
always  an  act  of  evangelical  freedom  and  never  of 
legal  constraint. 


340    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Some  of  us  occasionally  get  letters  somewhat  as 
follows:  "  If  you  wish  to  wear  a  gown  and  observe 
Easter  and  other  similar  days,  you  had  better  leave 
the  Baptist  denomination."  To  such  suggestions 
we  make  with  equal  earnestness,  and  we  trust  with 
more  courtesy,  this  reply  :  "  We  wish  to  oblige  you 
as  far  as  possible  ;  but  really  you  are  asking  too 
much.  We  are  compelled  to  say  we  shall  do  noth- 
ing of  the  kind.  The  Baptist  denomination  is  our 
denomination.  We  love  it.  We  live  for  it ;  and, 
if  need  be,  we  would  even  die  for  its  principles. 
If  there  is  any  going  out  to  be  done,  you  can  do  it 
yourself."  The  man  who  is  so  unfraternal,  unbap- 
tistic,  and  unscriptural  as  to  cherish  the  spirit  and 
make  the  remarks  occasionally  seen  and  heard,  is 
the  man  who  ought  to  go  out,  if  any  one  must  go. 

To  the  honor  of  the  denomination  it  ought  to  be 
said  that  men  of  that  spirit  are  becoming  conspicu- 
ous for  their  fewness.  Any  man  of  sense  can  have 
in  the  Baptist  denomination  to-day  all  the  liberty 
which  he  will  ask.  No  denomination  ought  to  be, 
and  none  is,  so  abreast  of  the  thought  alike  of  the 
first  and  the  nineteenth  centuries,  as  the  Baptist. 
Men  who  go  out  seeking  liberty,  often  find  that 
they  have  gone  into  a  prison  rather  than  into  a 
palace.  In  matters  not  commanded  by  Christ  and 
his  apostles,  we  have  the  right  to  exercise  our 
Christian  liberty.  We  shall  not  place  the  brother 
who  does  not  choose  to  observe  such  times  and 
seasons  under  the  ban  ;  we  shall  not  restrict  his 
liberty ;  we  shall  not  refuse  him  our  fellowship  and 


THE    CHRISTIAN    YEAR  34I 

fraternal  regard.  Neither  must  he  deny  the  brother 
who  in  these  respects  chooses  to  exercise  his  liberty, 
that  privilege.  We  have  no  faith  in  petty  popes, 
whether  in  editorial  or  theological  chairs  ;  whether 
on  platforms  or  in  pulpits.  We  shall  not  limit 
another  brother's  liberty,  neither  shall  we  suffer 
another  brother  to  limit  our  liberty, — our  liberty  in 
and  not  against  the  gospel, — no,  not  for  an  hour. 


XV 


SEPARATION  BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND 
STATE ^ 

AN    ARROGANT    ASSUMPTION 

NOTWITHSTANDING  the  fact  that  we  are 
in  the  closing  years  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tur}',  and  in  the  United  States,  this  is  still  a  living 
subject.  Questions  which  were  supposed  to  have 
been  exhaustively  discussed  and  conclusively  an- 
swered by  our  fathers  have  to  be  re-examined  and 
the  positions  reached  generations  ago  re-affirmed. 
In  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  there  is  a  party 
using  all  its  influence  to  change  the  name  of  that 
church  to  the  American  Church.  In  almost  every 
annual  convocation  of  that  body  this  party  makes 
itself  heard  in  its  attempts  to  secure  this  result. 
In  some  of  the  religious  papers  published  by  that 
church,  this  name  is  constantly  employed. 

This  is  one  of  the  most  striking  examples  of 
ecclesiastical  assumption  which  our  times  furnish 
on  either  side  of  the  Atlantic.  One  of  the  smallest 
of  the  sects  thus  appropriates  to  itself  the  name  of 
the  American  Church,  and  so  far  unchurches  every 

1  Delivered  before  the  Home  Mission  Society,  Philadelphia,  May 
27,  1892. 
342 


SEPARATION   BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    343 

other  church  ;  most  sectarian  of  the  sects,  it  calls 
itself  "The  Church,"  and  attempts  to  adopt  a  title 
suggestive  of  sole  religioiis  supremacy  on  this  con- 
tinent. If  the  spirit  thus  manifested  were  incar- 
nated in  the  name  of  the  church,  as  one  faction 
desires,  that  church  might  properly  be  called  the 
church  of  the  Un-American  Assumption.  By  what 
right  is  a  bishop  of  one  of  its  dioceses  called  Bishop 
of  New  York  ?  He  certainly  is  not  bishop  of  New 
York.  No  man  can  be  a  bishop  in  this  country' 
except  over  those  who  have  elected  him  to  that 
office.  The  Romanists  have  certainly  not  elected 
Dr.  Potter  to  that  office.  With  equal  assumption 
they  have  their  own  bishop  and  archbishop.  The 
Methodists  have  not  elected  him  ;  they  have  their 
own  bishop,  but  with  becoming  modesty  they  give 
him  a  title  which  limits  his  claims  and  functions  to 
the  body  by  which  he  is  elected  and  over  which  he 
presides.  The  Presbyterians  have  not  elected  him. 
The  Baptists  have  not  elected  him  ;  they  have  their 
own  bishops,  using  the  title  in  its  true  New  Testa- 
ment sense,  as  belonging  to  the  pastors  of  separate 
and  independent  churches.  The  appropriation  of 
these  titles  is  a  shadow  in  America  of  the  power 
possessed  by  Episcopalians  in  England,  where  their 
church  is  by  law  established.  It  is  here  an  eccle- 
siastical figment,  as,  according  to  the  late  Bishop 
Brooks,  the  so-called  apostolic  succession  is  a  his- 
toric figment. 

The    Roman    Church,    with    equal    assumption, 
manifests  similar  tendencies  in  our  American  life. 


344    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

It  is  constantly  assuming  positions,  manifesting 
tendencies,  and  occasionally  securing  powers,  en- 
tirely hostile  to  the  true  conception  of  the  relation 
which  should  exist  between  Church  and  State. 
We  have  in  this  church  a  subtle,  bold,  aggressive, 
and  unscrupulous  Jesuitical  party  aiming  at  the 
possession  of  vast  power  at  the  cost  to  us  of  much 
which  we  hold  dear  as  American  citizens  and  as 
Bible  Christians.  We  are  in  the  midst  of  Jesuits, 
who  have  been  driven  by  Catholic  rulers  from 
Catholic  countries  as  foes  to  those  countries,  and 
who  are  here  as  plotters  against  civil  and  religious 
liberty — ^Jesuits  whose  boldness  in  some  quarters 
is  equaled  only  by  their  subtle  machinations  in 
other  quarters.  This  party  at  this  moment,  it  is 
said,  is  laying  plans  to  secure  a  division  of  public 
moneys  for  the  support  of  parochial  schools.  This 
fight  is  already  upon  us  ;  it  has  been  opened  in 
New  Jersey  also,  and  in  Maryland,  and  it  is  in 
various  phases  waging  in  Canada. 

THIS    IS    A    LIVING    QUESTION. 

I  am  no  alarmist ;  but  I  agree  with  the  late 
General  Grant,  who  wisely  said  at  Des  Moines, 
Iowa,  in  1876  :  "  If  we  are  to  have  another  con- 
test in  the  near  future  of  our  national  experience,  I 
predict  that  the  dividing  line  will  not  be  Mason 
and  Dixon's,  but  it  will  be  between  patriotism  and 
intelligence  on  the  one  side,  and  superstition,  am- 
bition, and  ignorance  on  the  other."  Several 
Protestant  churches  are  now  taking  public  money 


SEPARATION   BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    345 

for  the  sectarian  education  of  Indians.^  The 
amount  appropriated  to  Protestant  denominations 
for  this  year  is  eighty  thousand  three  hundred  and 
fifty  dollars,  and  to  the  Roman  Church  three  hun- 
dred and  sixty-five  thousand  and  forty-five  dollars. 
I  am  no  pessimist,  but  neither  do  I  wish  to  be 
blinded  by  an  optimism  which  refuses  to  see  ex- 
isting dangers,  and  which  rejects  appropriate  rem- 
edies. The  subject  is,  then,  a  living  question,  a 
question  which  will  demand  and  receive  during  the 
closing  years  of  this  century  the  earnest  thought  of 
the  most  patriotic  and  devout  citizens  of  this  great 
republic.  It  is  fitting,  therefore,  that  we  should 
once  more  examine  our  positions,  once  more  state 
our  reasons,  and  once  more  affirm  with  unmistak- 
able emphasis  our  rights  and  our  duties. 

Insistence  on  the  entire  separation  of  Church 
and  State  brings  us,  as  citizens  and  Christians,  into 
sympathy  with  the  teachings  of  Christ  and  the 
apostles.  Our  Lord  with  rare  wisdom  recognized 
the  authority  of  the  State  in  all  secular  affairs.  If 
ever  there  was  a  religious  teacher  marked  by 
sanctified  common  sense,  that  teacher  was  Jesus 
Christ.  We  have  not  recognized  as  we  ought  his 
remarkable  shrewdness,  his  holy  adroitness,  and  his 
sacred  cleverness.  When  an  effort  was  made  to 
entrap  him  and  to  secure  from  him  a  pronounce- 
ment  which    his   foes   could   use   against  him,  he 

^  This  was  true  at  the  time,  1892.  Since  that,  however,  all  the 
Protestant  denominations  have  declined  to  receive  appropriations, 
and  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  is  left  alone  [Ed.]. 


346    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

lightly  stepped  over  the  snares  set  for  his  feet,  and 
soon  involved  his  enemies  in  the  toils  which  they 
had  laid  for  him.  He  at  once  perceived  their 
wickedness.  They  asked  a  question  which  they 
expected  would  place  him  in  a  hopeless  dilemma. 
If  he  replied  with  an  affirmative,  all  the  Pharisees 
would  announce  that  he  favored  paying  tribute  to 
Caesar.  From  this  admission  they  would  reason 
that  his  claims  to  be  the  Messianic  King  were 
ridiculous ;  they  would  also  charge  him  with  being 
neither  patriotic  nor  pious.  But  if  he  answered 
with  a  negative  the  Herodians  would  proceed  im- 
mediately to  Pilate  and  make  charges  against  him 
as  a  usurper. 

The  Romans  cared  little  for  the  religious  affairs 
of  the  Jewish  people ;  but  of  course  they  could 
not  permit  open  revolt  from  their  authority. 
Our  Lord's  answer  was  one  of  those  great  truths 
which  go  straight  to  the  heart  of  the  subject  dis- 
cussed. Under  the  theocracy,  duties  to  the  civil 
and  divine  ruler  were  practically  one  ;  but  now  that 
the  hated  Roman  was  civil  ruler,  the  distinction  be- 
tween civil  obligations  and  religious  requirements 
was  of  the  utmost  importance.  Jesus  here  gave  a 
great  object-lesson  on  this  subject.  Holding  up 
the  coin,  he  emphasized  obedience  to  Caesar  in 
secular  things  and  to  God  in  sacred  things.  His 
enemies  were  confounded.  Hostile  as  they  were, 
they  were  obliged  to  acknowledge  that  he  had 
placed  them  in  the  dilemma  from  which  he  had 
himself  escaped.     They  saw  also  that  he  had  de- 


SEPARATION  BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    2)47 

clined  to  act  the  part  of  a  political  Messiah,  and 
that  he  had  fully  answered  a  question  as  difficult 
as  it  was  important  He  here  distinctly  announced 
that  there  is  a  separation  between  the  Church  and 
the  State.  Later,  in  addressing  Pilate,  he  affirmed 
that  the  legitimate  powers  of  civil  rulers  were  of 
divine  origin. 

Peter  and  the  other  apostles  echo  the  truths 
taught  by  Christ  when,  in  their  reply  to  those  who 
commanded  them  not  to  teach  in  the  name  of 
Jesus  (Acts  5  :  20),  they  said  :  "We  ought  to  obey 
God  rather  than  men."  They  thus  made  a  direct 
appeal  to  the  best  instincts  of  their  enemies,  both 
as  judges  and  as  men.  The  Sanhedrin,  claiming  to 
be  appointed  by  God,  must  have  seen  the  force  of 
this  appeal,  for  all  admitted  that  the  authority  of  God 
was  superior  to  that  of  man.  The  announcement 
of  this  principle  has  had  important  bearings  on  hu- 
man liberty  from  the  first  century  even  to  the  nine- 
teenth. The  Apostle  Paul  in  writing  to  the  Romans 
recognizes  the  fact  that  the  civil  power  has  its 
rights,  and  also  that  those  rights  are  delegated  and 
limited.  In  the  letters  to  Timothy  and  Titus,  and 
also  in  the  first  Epistle  of  Peter,  similar  truths  are 
taught,  and  similar  courses  of  conduct  are  urged. 
It  is  affirmed  in  all  these  cases  that  when  civil  gov- 
ernment makes  demands  contrary  to  religious  duties 
its  authority  is  to  be  denied ;  but  in  other  cases  its 
mandates  are  to  be  obeyed.  Baptist'i  to-day,  in 
their  insistence  upon  separation  between  Church 
and  State,  are  in  full  harmony  with  the  teachings  of 


348    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Christ  and  the  apostles.  Our  highest  privilege  is 
to  be  in  all  respects  pupils  of  Jesus  Christ  and 
successors  of  the  apostles.  Standing  beside  him 
and  them  we  know  that  we  are  right.  Here  we 
have  ever  stood ;  and,  God  helping  us,  here  we 
shall  ever  stand. 

THE   GROWTH    OF   A   STATE   CHURCH. 

Insistence  upon  entire  separation  between 
Church  and  State  brings  us  into  sympathy  with 
noble  souls  through  all  the  centuries.  The  early 
Christians,  as  we  have  already  seen,  obeyed  civil 
law  in  secular  matters,  but  they  dared  to  disobey 
when  their  Christian  faith  was  in  peril.  Then  they 
refused  obedience  and  received  punishment  with 
Christian  submission  and  with  heroic  endurance. 
Their  persecutions  arose  chiefly  from  the  ancient 
laws  which  forbade  the  worship  of  deities  which 
the  State  did  not  recognize.  The  Roman  govern- 
ment was  tolerant  of  various  religions  when  their 
representatives  were  quiescent ;  but  when  Chris- 
tians became  active  in  propagating  their  faith  they 
encountered  fierce  civil  opposition.  It  is  certain 
that  some  of  these  early  Christians  were  soldiers 
and  that  others  held  various  offices  under  the  gov- 
ernment; but  they  believed  that  their  positions 
were  not  inconsistent  with  their  Christian  faith. 

With  the  conversion  of  Constantine  we  enter 
upon  a  new  era  in  the  relation  between  Church 
and  State.  Then  privileges  were  granted  to  the 
officers  of  the  church,  giving  them  rights  similar  to 


SEPARATION  BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    349 

those  which  had  previously  been  enjoyed  by  pagan 
priests.  The  first  exhibition  of  State-churchism  is 
thus  a  direct  result  of  pagan  ideas  introduced  into 
the  church.  The  emperor  soon  became  known  as 
Pontifex  Maximus.  Constantine  did  not  hesitate 
to  place  the  cross  on  one  side  of  the  coins  in  use, 
and  the  symbol  of  the  sun-god  on  the  other  side. 
The  emperors  soon  came  to  consider  themselves  as 
patrons  of  the  church.  It  is  true  that  prominent 
teachers,  such  as  Ambrose,  Jerome,  and  others, 
vigorously  denied  the  right  of  the  emperors  to 
pronounce  on  religious  questions  and  duties.  Thus 
the  conflict  between  bishops  and  emperors  con- 
tinued, now  one  and  now  the  other  exercising  the 
greater  authority.  In  494  Bishop  Gelasius  affirmed 
the  superiority  of  the  ecclesiastical  over  the  secular 
power;  and  in  502  Bishop  Symmachus  resisted  the 
assumptions  of  King  Odoacer  over  the  rights  of 
ecclesiastical  officers. 

Charlemagne  conceived  the  idea  of  a  universal 
Christian  monarchy ;  and  he  considered  it  his  right 
to  oppose  or  to  endorse  the  election  of  even  the 
pope,  as  well  as  that  of  the  bishops.  His  succes- 
sors, however,  were  too  weak  to  carry  into  effect  the 
ideas  which  he  had  first  promulgated.  From  this 
time  the  popes  increased  their  powers  at  the  ex- 
pense of  those  of  the  emperors.  But  in  the  ninth 
and  tenth  centuries  the  papal  throne  was  nearly 
overthrown  by  the  immoralities  of  some  of  the 
popes ;  and  as  a  result  the  imperial  power  again 
greatly  increased.     About  the  middle  of  the  elev- 


350    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 


enth  century  Hildebrand  put  forth  exorbitant  claims 
for  the  papal  see ;  and  soon  the  power  of  the  em- 
perors in  the  election  of  popes  was  annulled  and 
given  to  the  college  of  cardinals.  Under  the 
name  of  Gregory  VII.,  Hildebrand,  in  1073,  took 
his  seat  upon  the  papal  throne,  and  boldly  claimed 
that  the  church  was  the  highest  power  in  the  world, 
and  that  the  secular  governments  owed  their  exist- 
ence to  the  permission  of  the  church.  These  as- 
sumptions led  to  unceasing  conflicts  with  the  Ger- 
man emperor,  especially  as  the  views  of  Gregory 
were  maintained  by  Alexander  III.  and  Innocent 
III.  Boniface  VIII.,  in  his  famous  bull,  "  Unam 
Sanctam,''  held  the  belief  that  it  was  necessary  to 
salvation  to  believe  that  the  Roman  popes  had 
power  over  everything  earthly ;  but  he  suffered 
severely  for  his  extraordinary  assumptions  thus  ex- 
pressed. His  own  death,  the  transfer  of  the  papal 
see  to  Avignon,  and  the  great  schism,  were  the 
direct  fruits  of  the  unholy  seed  which  Boniface 
had  sown.  One  of  the  Avignon  popes  revoked 
this  blasphemous  bull,  as  far  as  concerned  France, 
although  it  was  afterward  restored  by  Leo  X.,  in 
1 5  16. 

When  we  come  to  the  time  of  the  Reformation, 
we  find  all  these  principles  entering  vigorously  into 
the  grave  discussions  of  the  hour.  Luther  and 
Calvin,  Zwinglius  and  Melancthon,  and  others,  con- 
demned the  claims  of  the  Church  of  Rome.  At 
times  they  saw  the  truth,  but  through  a  glass 
darkly ;  at  other  times  they  were  involved  in  hope- 


SEPARATION   BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    35  I 

less  confusion  and  seemingly  in  Egyptian  dark- 
ness. Some  of  their  writings  show  that  they  wished 
to  keep  the  two  powers  separate,  and  that  they 
favored  the  government  of  the  church  by  the 
church  ;  but,  as  many  Reformers  clung  to  the  idea 
of  a  Christian  State,  whose  magistrates  had  a  right 
to  punish  heresy,  there  was  no  clear  teaching  re- 
garding separation  of  Church  and  State.  I  do  not 
charge  Calvin  with  the  execution  of  Servetus  ;  but 
I  have  a  right  to  rebuke  him  for  not  exercising  the 
power  which  he  possessed  to  prevent  that  execu- 
tion. State  Churchism  came  finally  to  be  estab- 
lished in  the  Lutheran  and  Reformed  countries. 
The  Roman  Church  used  force  to  suppress  Protes- 
tantism ;  Protestantism  therefore  justified  itself  in 
using  force  to  maintain  its  existence.  Rationalism 
and  infidelity  later  exercised  some  influence  in  re- 
stricting the  power  of  the  church.  The  French 
Revolution,  in  1789,  shook  ecclesiastical  structures 
to  their  very  foundations.  The  Congress  of  Vienna, 
in  181 5,  led  eventually  to  the  recognition  of  Lu- 
theran and  Reformed  churches,  as  well  as  Roman, 
as  State  churches  in  different  countries. 

PRECIOUS    TRUTHS    MAINTAINED    BY    BAPTISTS. 

The  persecutions  in  the  Old  World,  which  drove 
many  dissenters  to  the  New  World,  opened  the  dis- 
cussion afresh  on  the  virgin  soil  of  America.  All 
through  these  bloody  periods  there  were  brave 
Baptists  who  saw,  who  held,  and  who  were  willing 
to  die  for  the  truth.     They  held  substantially  the 


352    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

principles  which  are  maintained  by  Baptists  to  this 
hour.  They  opposed  infant  baptism,  which  was  the 
cause  of  many  of  the  greatest  evils  which  ever  dis- 
honored the  pages  of  church  history.  They  con- 
demned vigorously  the  doctrine  of  salvation  by 
baptism.  Among  these  were  the  Paulicians  of 
Eastern  Europe,  and  the  Petrobrusians  and  Henri- 
cians  in  the  West.  They  vigorously  preached  the 
Baptist  doctrines  of  salvation  by  faith  alone.  They 
saw  that  infant  baptism  was  responsible  in  large 
part  for  the  union  of  Church  and  State,  and  also 
for  the  bloody  persecutions  which  resulted  from 
that  union.  In  the  times  of  the  Reformation  these 
truer  disciples  of  Christ  were  numerous  in  Switzer- 
land, Bavaria,  the  Tyrol,  the  Rhine  country,  and 
the  Netherlands.  They  rightly  denied  their  nick- 
name of  Anabaptists,  declaring  that  infant  baptism 
was  no  baptism  at  all.  They  were  men  of  civil 
virtue  as  well  as  of  spiritual  purity.  They  were 
put  to  death  by  hundreds  for  their  evangelical 
faith,  so  that  no  Christian  body  has  given  so  many 
martyrs  to  the  faith  of  a  pure  gospel  as  has  the 
Baptist.  The  idea  that  only  converted  persons 
should  belong  to  the  church  was  originally,  dis- 
tinctively, and  exclusively  a  Baptist  tenet ;  so  was 
the  doctrine  that  infant  baptism  was  not  necessary 
to  save  dying  infants.  Infant  baptism  is  one  of  the 
darkest  and  dreariest  superstitions  that  ever  afflicted 
the  church  ;  and  the  history  of  its  observance  is 
one  of  the  most  horrible  chapters  in  the  annals  of 
Christianity. 


SEPARATION   BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    353 

In  bearing  testimony  against  infant  baptism  and 
in  favor  of  infant  salvation,  Baptists  also  testified  to 
the  doctrine  of  separation  between  Church  and 
State.  This  testimony  was  not  merely  a  lucky 
thought  of  astute  Baptist  philosophers  ;  it  was  the 
logical  outcome  of  distinctive  Baptist  principles. 
How  came  they  to  be  so  much  wiser  than  all  other 
religious  bodies  ?  Their  wisdom  lay  in  the  fact 
that  they  grasped  the  great  principles  laid  down 
by  Christ  and  the  apostles.  They  preceded  all 
others  in  declaring  the  true  relations  between  civil 
and  ecclesiastical  bodies,  because  they  held  correct 
scriptural  principles,  while  all  others  were  involved 
in  the  meshes  of  unscriptural  tenets.  Baptists  thus 
were  the  first  to  condemn  the  use  of  force  in  re- 
ligion. Down  to  a  comparatively  late  date,  if  a 
man  said  that  the  civil  magistrate  should  not  inter- 
fere in  strictly  religious  matters,  it  was  known 
thereby  that  he  was  a  Baptist.  Most  Protestant 
churches  have  now  come  to  the  adoption  of  these 
views  which  once  were  exclusively  Baptist  doc- 
trines. 

The  Baptist  who  does  not  rejoice  in  the  history 
of  his  denomination  must  be  pitiably  ignorant  or 
he  must  be  hopelessly  unappreciative  of  Christian 
intelligence  and  heroic  endurance.  Such  a  Baptist 
must  have  avast  amount  of  ignorance  in  his  brains, 
or  of  iced-water  instead  of  good  red  blood  in  his 
veins.  A  glance  over  the  brilliant  path  which 
Baptist  heroes  and  martyrs  have  made  through  the 
dark  centuries  will  arouse  in  all  our  people  a  holy 

X 


354    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

enthusiasm  for  the  loyal  adherence  of  our  fathers 
to  the  word  of  God,  and  for  the  heroic  faith  which 
made  them  willing  to  do  or  die  in  support  of  the 
truths  they  held.  We  would  be  unworthy  sons  of 
these  noble  and  sainted  sires  if  we  did  not  bless 
God  for  their  lives,  if  we  did  not  consecrate  our- 
selves afresh  to  the  maintenance  of  the  principles 
for  which  they  were  willing  to  go  to  the  dungeon 
and  the  rack,  to  the  gibbet  and  the  stake.  In  this 
land  of  freedom  we  put  the  crown  of  our  gratitude 
and  of  their  enduring  fame  on  the  brows  of  these 
martyred  and  sainted  heroes. 

I  have  shown  that  insistence  upon  separation 
betw^een  Church  and  State  brings  us  into  sympathy 
with  the  teachings  of  Christ  and  the  apostles,  and 
also  with  noble  souls  through  all  the  centuries. 
We  are  now  prepared  to  see  that  this  principle 
brings  us  into  sympathy  with  the  foremost  thinkers 
of  our  day  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic,  and  that 
it  especially  emphasizes  the  duties  and  privileges  of 
a  patriotic  Americanism. 

AMERICAN    INFLUENCE. 

With  the  Declaration  of  Independence  the  abso- 
lute separation  of  Church  and  State  was  intended 
to  be  established  in  this  republic.  Then  all  forms 
of  belief  secured  legal  equality  in  this  land.  The 
growth  of  our  churches  under  the  influence  of  this 
principle  has  widely  affected  political  and  religious 
thinking  in  the  Old  World.  Independence  of  the 
State  is  now  claimed  by  many  religionists  in  Euro- 


SEPARATION  BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    355 

pean  lands,  and  the  claim  is  emphasized  by  political 
parties,  which  insist  upon  this  separation  as  a  plank 
in  their  platforms.  Occasionally  contradictoiy  in- 
terests unite  in  demanding  this  separation.  The 
High  Church  party  in  Great  Britain  desires  separa- 
tion in  order  to  give  the  Church  release  from  her 
bondage  to  the  State,  that  she  may  be  free  to  in- 
troduce High  Church  practices  which  the  State 
now  condemns.  Nonconformists  at  this  point, 
though  for  widely  different  reasons,  join  hands  with 
the  representatives  of  the  High  Church.  The  fore- 
most political  thinkers  in  Scotland  and  Wales  are 
now  earnestly  agitating  these  questions.  The  Church 
of  England  has  been  disestablished  in  Ireland ;  and 
the  Church  of  Scotland,  without  doubt,  soon  will  be 
disestablished  in  Scotland.  Wales  will  follow  in 
throwing  off  the  ecclesiastical  yoke,  and  England 
herself  cannot  long  refuse  to  walk  in  line  in  this 
march  of  progress. 

The  British  government  is  now  inflicting  a  great 
wrong  upon  all  Nonconformists.  What  right  has  a 
government  to  discriminate  among  reHgions?  What 
right  have  certain  religious  teachers  to  receive  sal- 
aries from  the  State  ?  What  right  has  the  govern- 
ment to  legislate  for  a  national  church?  What  right 
to  sit  in  judgment  upon  creeds  ?  What  right  to 
prefer  one  denomination  over  another?  These 
questions  must  be  answered,  and  they  will  soon  be 
answered  at  the  ballot-box  in  every  land. 

Even  under  the  shadow  of  the  Roman  Church 
the   principle  of  separation   between   Church   and 


356    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

State  has  found  earnest  advocates.  The  brave  and 
brilliant  Cavour  lifted  up  his  eloquent  voice  for  a 
"  free  Church  in  a  free  State."  So  has  Baron 
Ricasoli.  These  are  some  of  the  stirring  words 
in  a  letter  dated  November  26,  1866  : 

In  the  United  States  every  citizen  is  free  to  follow  the 
persuasion  that  he  may  think  best,  and  to  worship  the 
Divinity  in  the  form  that  may  seem  to  him  most  appropri- 
ate. Side  by  side  with  the  Catholic  Church  rises  the  Prot- 
estant temple,  the  Mussulman  mosque,  the  Chinese  pagoda. 
Side  by  side  with  the  Romish  clergy  the  Genevan  consistory 
and  the  Methodist  assembly  exercise  their  office.  This 
state  of  things  generates  neither  confusion  nor  clashing. 
And  why  is  this  ?  Because  no  religion  asks  either  special 
protection  or  privileges  from  the  State.  .  .  The  bishops 
cannot  be  considered  among  us  as  simple  pastors  of  souls, 
since  they  are  at  the  same  time  the  instruments  and  de- 
fenders of  a  power  at  variance  with  the  national  aspirations. 
The  civil  power  is  therefore  constrained  to  impose  those 
measures  upon  the  bishops  which  are  necessary  to  preserve 
its  rights  and  those  of  the  nation.  How  is  it  possible  to 
terminate  this  deplorable  and  perilous  conflict  between  the 
two  powers — between  Church  and  State  ?  Let  us  render 
unto  Ccesar  the  things  that  are  Caesar's,  and  unto  God  the 
things  that  are  God's,  and  peace  between  Church  and  State 
will  be  troubled  no  more. 

DANGERS    AND    DUTIES. 

We  are  confronted  at  this  moment  by  practical 
dangers  and  pressing  duties  in  our  own  beloved 
land.  We  have  all  seen  that  separation  between 
Church  and  State  was  one  of  the  fundamental  prin- 
ciples of  our  Constitution,  and  that  great  instru- 
ment insisted  on  perfect  freedom  of  worship  and 


SEPARATION    BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    357 

the  protection  of  each  religious  body  in  the  exer- 
cise of  its  religious  rights,  so  far  as  they  did  not 
interfere  with  the  rights  of  others,  or  violate  ac- 
cepted moral  laws.  It  is  clear  that  it  was  the  in- 
tention of  the  Constitution  that  the  government 
should  not  show  special  favor  toward  any  religious 
body  or  to  any  set  of  denominational  opinions. 
This  view  is  clearly  deducible  from  the  deliverance 
of  the  Convention  of  1787;  but  several  of  the 
States  deemed  it  important  to  adopt  amendments 
which  should  make  this  cardinal  principle  more 
unmistakable  and  emphatic.  As  a  result  the  first 
amendment  reads  as  follows  :  "Congress  shall  make 
no  law  respecting  an  establishment  of  religion  or 
prohibiting  the  free  exercise  thereof"  Although 
the  several  States  retained  the  right  to  make  ap- 
propriations for  sectarian  purposes,  the  feeling 
throughout  the  country  was  so  earnestly  against 
such  appropriations  that  a  direct  prohibition  was 
not  deemed  necessary  by  the  different  States.  For 
many  years  there  has  been  a  growing  sentiment  in 
favor  of  an  amendment  to  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States  which  should  specifically  emphasize 
the  absolute  separation  between  civil  government 
and  the  ecclesiastical  authority,  and  which  shall 
forbid  granting  public  moneys  to  sectarian  schools 
or  charities.  Doubtless  this  matter  will  come  be- 
fore the  New  York  Constitutional  Convention  which 
will  soon  be  held.  The  separation  of  Church  and 
State  has  secured  for  us  many  of  the  greatest  bless- 
ings which  have  marked  our  history. 


358    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  writer  has  the  honor  of  belonging  to  the 
National  League  for  the  Protection  of  American  In- 
stitutions, and  he  has  been  somewhat  familiar  with 
the  discussions  in  that  body,  which  have  led  to  the 
preparation  of  what  is  known  as  the  Sixteenth 
Amendment.  As  early  as  1875,  President  Grant 
proposed  an  amendment  of  this  character.  Intro- 
duced into  the  House  by  Mr.  Blaine,  it  was  passed 
by  an  overwhelming  majority  ;  but  unfortunately  it 
was  defeated  in  the  Senate.  In  1876  the  National 
Republican  Convention  at  Cincinnati,  and  the  Na- 
tional Democratic  Convention  at  St.  Louis,  inserted 
in  their  respective  platforms  planks  committing 
them  to  the  doctrine  which  President  Grant  had 
suggested.  The  National  League  already  named 
has  been  specially  active  during  the  past  few  years 
in  pressing  this  Sixteenth  Amendment,  and  on  Jan- 
uary 18,  1892,  on  behalf  of  the  National  League, 
the  Hon.  William  M.  Springer,  of  Illinois,  intro- 
duced in  the  House  of  Representatives,  a  memorial 
and  petition  for  the  passage  of  the  proposed  Six- 
teenth Amendment  to  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States.     This  amendment  is  as  follows  : 

No  State  shall  pass  any  law  respecting  an  establishment 
of  religion,  or  prohibiting  the  free  exercise  thereof,  or  use 
its  property  or  credit,  or  any  money  raised  by  taxation,  or 
authorize  either  to  be  used,  for  the  purpose  of  founding, 
maintaining,  or  aiding,  by  appropriation,  payment  of  serv- 
ices, expenses,  or  otherwise,  any  church,  religious  denom- 
ination, or  religious  society,  or  any  institution,  society,  or 
undertaking  which  is  wholly  or  in  part  under  sectarian  or 
ecclesiastical  control. 


SEPARATION   BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    359 

On  the  same  day  Senator  Piatt,  of  Connecticut, 
introduced  the  same  memorial  and  petition  in  the 
Senate.  Each  house  referred  the  matter  to  its 
Committee  on  Judiciaiy. 

Several  considerations  led  to  the  preparation  and 
presentation  of  this  proposed  amendment.  One 
of  its  objects  is  to  prevent  the  admission  of  Utah 
to  the  Union  until  she  is  purged  of  her  abominable 
Mormonism.  This  amendment  raises  a  barrier 
against  the  effort  to  legalize  the  Mormon  hierarchy, 
and  to  make  it  a  part  of  the  government  of  the 
State.  Two  churches,  the  Mormon  and  the  Roman, 
are  to-day  practically  attempting  to  destroy  the 
time-honored  principle  of  separation  between  Church 
and  State.  The  Mormons  are  determined  to  main- 
tain the  union  of  Church  and  State  in  Utah  ;  and 
the  Roman  Church  joins  hands  with  the  Mormon 
Church  to  destroy  this  distinctive  principle  of 
Americanism. 

There  is  no  denomination  which  can  so  consist- 
ently oppose  the  Roman  Church  as  the  Baptist. 
We  have  ever  championed  the  right  of  soul-liberty, 
even  at  the  cost  of  imprisonment  and  death  ;  we 
have  ever  denied  the  right  of  the  State  to  dictate 
as  to  our  duties  to  God  ;  we  have  ever  insisted  on 
the  distinction  between  Church  and  State  as  laid 
down  by  Christ  and  his  apostles.  We  have  denied 
the  "  compact  of  the  priest  and  potentate  to  crush 
the  rights  of  conscience  ;  the  combination  of  legal 
and  prelatical  tyranny  to  repress  true  religion." 
We  have  ever  denied  the  right  of  civil  rulers  to 


360    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

make  assessments  and  to  raise  money  for  the  support 
of  sectarian  principles  ;  we  have  ever  denied  the 
right  of  government  either  to  patronize  or  to  coerce 
a  denomination  ;  we  have  ever  scorned  to  accept 
toleration  as  a  substitute  for  liberty  ;  we  have  ever 
affirmed  that  religious  freedom  is  an  utter  misnomer 
wherever  the  unhallowed  union  between  Church 
and  State  exists.  The  time  is  opportune  to  reaffirm 
these  great  principles,  and  to  declare  our  fealty  to 
Christ  and  the  apostles  in  their  teaching  on  this 
subject,  our  sympathy  with  our  Baptist  fathers 
through  the  ages,  and  our  endorsement  of  the  brave 
men  in  all  countries  and  denominations  in  our  own 
day,  who  are  standmg  for  the  maintenance  of  the 
separation  between  Church  and  State.  The  Roman 
Church  is  to  be  dreaded  and  resisted  in  her  en- 
croachments upon  American  liberty  at  this  very 
hour. 

The  Sixteenth  Amendment  ought  to  be  passed, 
and  become  a  part  of  our  glorious  Constitution. 
We  do  not  say  that  the  Roman  Church  has  not  the 
right,  as  things  now  are,  to  the  large  amount  of 
money  which  she  is  receiving  for  Indian  education, 
providing  she  makes  true  reports  of  the  number  of 
pupils  under  her  care.  The  Presbyterian,  the  Meth- 
odist, the  Episcopal,  the  Lutheran,  the  Congrega- 
tional, and  other  churches,  have  erred  with  the 
Roman  Church  in  accepting  public  money  for  sec- 
tarian instruction.  The  largest  sum  has  gone  to  the 
Roman  Church,  for  the  reason  that  by  various 
processes  that  church    has   reported    the   greatest 


SEPARATION  BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    36 1 

number  of  children  as  under  her  instruction.  So 
long  as  other  bodies  take  this  money,  and  so  long 
as  the  appropriations  are  made  on  the  per  capita 
principle,  and  so  long  as  the  Roman  Church  reaches, 
or  so  claims,  as  many  children  as  all  these  other  bodies 
combined,  so  long  will  she  have  a  claim  to  this  larger 
sum  of  money.  The  total  amount  appropriated 
has  been  more  than  half  a  million  dollars  annu- 
ally. The  trouble  is  with  the  entire  system  ;  it  is 
wrong  in  principle  and  it  is  vicious  in  practice.  It 
is  inconsistent  with  the  spirit  of  the  Constitution  ; 
and  if  brought  to  the  test  of  the  courts,  it  is  quite 
likely  that  these  appropriations  would  be  pronounced 
illegal.  Several  churches  have  in  their  various 
convocations  passed  resolutions  against  taking  this 
public  money  for  sectarian  schools  ;  but  somehow, 
in  most  cases,  the  amounts  are  still  reported  as 
appropriated.  We  here  affirm  that  no  body  of 
Christians  has  a  right  to  receive  public  money  for 
sectarian  instruction.  The  Protestant  bodies,  that 
have  taken  this  money  and  are  opposed  to  grants 
for  parochial  schools  in  different  States,  have  acted 
with  utter  inconsistency.  They  have  taken  all  that 
they  could  get  from  the  public  treasury  for  the 
support  of  denominational  schools  among  Indians, 
while  they  are  opposed  to  giving  the  Romanists 
public  moneys  for  their  parochial  schools.  Baptists 
give  their  greetings  to  all  churches  that  have  de- 
clared that  they  will  no  longer  receive  public  funds 
for  sectarian  uses  ;  and  we  hope  that  they  will  be 
true  to  their  reported  declarations.     The  attitude 


362    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

of  the  Roman  Church  regarding  the  so-called 
"Freedom  of  Worship  Bill"  in  New  York  shows, 
on  the  one  hand,  the  danger  to  which  we  are  ex- 
posed, and  on  the  other  hand,  the  pernicious  ac- 
tivity of  that  church.  That  church  under  this  bill 
is  determined  to  establish  Roman  ceremonies  and 
teachings  in  State  institutions  supported,  in  whole 
or  in  part,  by  the  whole  body  of  taxpayers,  insti- 
tutions that  ought  to  remain  forever  non-sectarian. 
The  discrimination  made  in  favor  of  the  Roman 
Church  in  this  regard  is  a  blot  upon  the  history  of 
New  York  State,  and  an  outrage  which  no  fair- 
minded  American  can  impassionately  contemplate. 
The  Roman  Church  is  determined  also  to  violate 
the  time-honored  principle  of  separation  between 
Church  and  State  in  its  effort  to  secure  public 
moneys  for  its  parochial  schools.  It  is,  without 
doubt,  the  determination  of  that  church  to  secure 
this  end.  Archbishop  Corrigan  and  Archbishop 
Ireland  are  aiming  at  the  same  end,  though  they 
desire  to  reach  it  by  different  methods  ;  the  first  is 
open,  bold,  and  defiant ;  the  latter  is  subtle,  skill- 
ful, and  politic.  The  Roman  Church  is  the  ill- 
concealed  or  openly  avowed  foe  of  the  public 
school  system.  A  few  quotations  from  her  own 
recognized  authorities  show  clearly  her  hostility  to 
the  civil  power  as  well  as  to  the  public  schools  : 
"The  people  are  not  the  source  of  civil  power."  ^ 
"  Education  outside  the  control  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  is  a  damnable  heresy."^     "The 

1  Pius  IX.,  Enc.  39.  2  Pope's  Syllabus. 


SEPARATION   BETWEEN  CHURCH  AND  STATE    363 

Roman  Church  has  a  right  to  interfere  in  the  dis- 
cipUne  of  the  pubhc  schools,  and  in  the  arrange- 
ment of  the  studies  of  the  pubhc  schools,  and  in 
the  choice  of  teachers  for  these  schools."  ^  "Pub- 
lic schools  open  to  all  children  for  the  education  of 
the  young  should  be  under  the  control  of  the 
Roman  Church,  and  should  not  be  subject  to  the 
civil  power,  nor  made  to  conform  to  the  opinions 
of  the  age."  ^  "The  Catechism  alone  is  essential 
for  the  education  of  the  people."  ^  "The  common 
school  system  of  the  United  States  is  the  worst  in 
the  world."  ^  "The  public  schools  have  produced 
nothing  but  a  godless  generation  of  thieves  and 
blackguards."  ^  "I  frankly  confess  that  the  Cath- 
olics stand  before  the  country  as  the  enemies  of 
the  public  schools."  ^  Later  declarations  betray  a 
similar  hostility  ;  the  modified  endorsement  of  Mgr. 
Satolli  is  practically  opposition  to  our  schools. 

We  are  prepared  to  say  that  no  parochial  school 
can  give  the  training  which  our  public  schools  fur- 
nish. Public  schools  should  be  the  great  kinder- 
gartens of  true  American  patriotism.  The  Sixteenth 
Amendment  will  receive  the  endorsement  of  intel- 
ligent Americans  in  all  parts  of  our  broad  land. 
The  National  League  has  among  its  supporters 
many  of  the  most  prominent  men  in  different  de- 
nominations in  the  country,  including  statesmen, 
jurists,  divines,  authors,  college  presidents,  students 

1  Pope  Pius  IX.,  Enc.  45.         "''  Pope  Pius  IX.,  Enc.  47. 
3  Cardinal  Antonelli.  *   Cardinal  Manning. 

^  Priest  Schauer.  ^  Father  Phelan. 


364    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

of  political  science,  philanthropists,  and  patriots. 
In  all  these  great  movements  for  the  maintenance 
of  libert}^,  and  for  all  that  is  noblest  and  divinest  in 
Americanism,  Baptists,  alike  by  their  principles  and 
history,  will  be  leaders.  The  denomination  which 
gave  us  many  brave  heroes  and  martyrs  in  the  mid- 
dle ages,  and  which  gave  us  John  Clark,  Obadiah 
Holmes,  and  James  Crandall  in  Boston  in  165 1  ; 
which  gave  us  Clay,  Pickett,  and  the  Craigs ;  which 
gave  us  the  heroic  Ireland,  who  preached  the  gospel 
through  the  bars  of  the  Culpeper  prison  ;  which 
gave  us  Roger  Williams  and  a  host  more  whose 
names,  honored  in  America  and  glorified  in  heaven, 
time  would  fail  me  to  enumerate,  will  ever  march 
in  the  forefront  for  American  liberty,  and  for  the 
right  to  worship  God  according  to  the  dictates  of 
conscience. 

Baptists  will  ever  be  ready  to  say,  with  that  bril- 
liant statesman,  James  G.  Blaine:  "It  seems  to  me 
that  this  [school]  question  ought  to  be  settled  in 
some  definite  and  comprehensive  way,  and  the  only 
settlement  that  can  be  final  is  the  complete  victory 
for  non-sectarian  schools.  I  am  sure  this  will  be 
demanded  by  the  American  people  at  all  hazard, 
and  at  any  cost"  ;  and  with  the  illustrious  Grant : 
"  Leave  the  matter  of  religion  to  the  family  altar, 
the  church,  and  the  private  school  supported  en- 
tirely by  private  contribution.  Keep  the  Church 
and  the  State  forever  separate." 


XVI 

THE  REGENERATION  OF  A  RACE^ 

HISTORY  is  stranger  than  prophecy;  God's 
facts  are  more  wonderful  than  man's  fan- 
cies. The  quarter  of  a  century  which  fittingly 
closed  with  the  death  of  General  Grant  is  the  most 
remarkable  period  of  twenty-five  years  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  race.  This  statement  is  true  as  it  is 
strong.  You  may  carefully  examine  the  history  of 
Oriental  nations,  the  history  of  Greece  and  Rome, 
of  France  and  Germany,  of  Italy  and  Austria,  of 
Great  Britain  and  all  her  colonies,  and  the  previous 
history  of  the  United  States,  and  you  will  find  no 
period  of  twenty-five  years  in  which  so  many  great 
social,  political,  and  moral  questions  were  anxiously 
asked  and  rightly  answered,  as  during  the  period 
already  named.  The  only  possible  exception,  and 
that  exception  is  a  matter  of  interpretation,  is  the 
period  marking  the  birth,  death,  and  resurrection 
of  Jesus  Christ. 

We  are  always  disposed  to  depreciate  the  present. 
We  see  the  past  veiled  in  the  mists  of  memory, 
mists  which  soften  its  deformities  and  magnify  its 
beauties.  We  see  the  future  radiant  with  the 
splendor  of  hope  ;  but  the  present  is,  to  most  ob- 

1  Delivered  before  the  American  Baptist  Home  Mission  Society, 
at  Saratoga,  May  23,  1894. 

365 


366    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

servers,  insignificant,  threadbare,  and  commonplace. 
We  stand  too  near  its  great  events  rightly  to  appre- 
ciate their  intrinsic  or  relative  importance.  We 
need  historic  perspective  to  enable  us  to  see  cur- 
rent movements  in  their  historic  relations.  Every 
traveler  visiting  the  valley  of  Chamouni  and  gazing 
for  the  first  time  on  Mont  Blanc,  experiences  dis- 
appointment The  mountain  is  not  so  high,  not  so 
vast,  not  so  majestic,  as  he  had  supposed.  He 
forgets  that  the  valley  itself  is  three  thousand  four 
hundred  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea  and  more 
than  two  thousand  feet  above  Lake  Geneva ;  he 
forgets  that  the  mountain  is  surrounded  with  snow- 
capped, white-robed,  and  cloud-kissed  attendants, 
themselves  beautiful  and  majestic.  Not  until  he 
has  driven  on  the  magnificent  road  to  Geneva,  and 
has  looked  back  upon  the  mountain  lifting  its 
crystal  domes  and  glittering  spires  fifteen  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  eighty-one  feet  into  God's  clear 
blue  or  losing  themselves  amid  the  clouds,  will  he 
appreciate  its  grandeur  and  glory  as  the  king  of 
the  Alps  ;  he  will  be  ready  then  to  say  with  Lord 
Byron  : 

Mont  Blanc  is  the  monarch  of  mountains  ; 

They  crowned  him  long  ago 
On  a  throne  of  rocks,  in  a  robe  of  clouds. 

With  a  diadem  of  snow. 

Two  brothers-in-law  of  mine  were  in  the  battle 
of  Gettysburg.  They  have  often  spoken  of  the 
humdrum  duties  and  commonplace  routine  which 
marked  much  of  the  time  during  that  battle  and 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  367 

Other  terrible  battles  of  those  historic  days.  They 
knew  that  they  were  participating  in  one  of  the 
decisive  battles  of  the  world,  and  yet  amid  their 
daily  routine  and  commonplace  duty  it  was  hard 
to  realize  that  they  were  making  immortal  history. 
We  are  so  often  blinded  by  the  smoke  and  deaf- 
ened by  the  din  of  battle  in  our  everyday  life, 
that  we  fail  rightly  to  appreciate  the  movements 
of  the  great  forces  which  are  making  for  the  good 
of  men  and  the  glory  of  God.  It  has  been  said 
that  "  Memory's  geese  are  all  swans."  The  great 
Burke  lamented  over  the  mediocre  character  of 
statesmen  and  orators  in  his  day ;  but  we  all  are 
ready  to  say  of  the  men  of  his  day,  and  of  other 
similar  epochs,  "There  were  giants  in  those  days." 

We  have  only  to  think  of  some  of  the  great 
events  which  occurred  during  the  third  quarter  of 
the  present  century  to  appreciate  their  greatness. 
We  saw  during  this  period  all  Germany  united  into 
one  great  empire  ;  we  saw  France  devastated  by 
war,  and  recuperating  with  a  rapidity  as  surprising 
as  it  was  delightful  ;  we  saw  Italy  united,  the  tem- 
poral power  of  the  pope  forever  destroyed,  and 
Victor  Emmanuel  riding  in  triumph  into  the  eternal 
city  as  king  of  United  Italy.  We  saw  Alexander 
the  Second  of  Russia  issuing  his  imperial  ukase 
and  giving  liberty  to  more  than  forty  million  serfs. 
And  we  have  seen  the  greatest  civil  war  of  the 
world  waged  on  our  shores,  the  chains  of  bondage 
stricken  from  four  million  American  slaves,  and  we 
have  heard  the  song  of  liberty  rolling  across  this 


368    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

land  from  the  mighty  Atlantic  to  the  mightier  Pa- 
cific, chanted  by  rejoicing  millions,  with  the  music 
of  both  oceans  as  its  sublime  accompaniment. 

But  we  have  not  yet  fully  appreciated  the  signifi- 
cance of  the  emancipation  of  the  American  Negro. 
Generations  hence  historians  will  set  this  great 
event  in  its  true  light.  It  will  be  hundreds  of  years 
before  the  characters  of  Seward,  Grant,  Lincoln,  and 
other  American  heroes  and  statesmen,  will  be  appre- 
ciated at  their  true  value.  It  requires  great  lapses 
of  time  rightly  to  estimate  any  great  character  of 
history ;  we  are  only  now  learning  truly  to  judge 
Martin  Luther,  William  the  Silent,  and  Oliver 
Cromwell.  Carlyle,  in  1846,  gave  the  world,  for 
the  first  time,  a  true  conception  of  the  majestic 
Oliver  Cromwell,  the  greatest  man  England  has  yet 
produced.  The  coming  historian  will  yet  show  us 
that  the  memory  of  Abraham  Lincoln  has  lifted 
itself  like  a  mighty  dome  over  the  American  Re- 
public— a  dome  through  which  the  sun  shines  by 
day  and  the  moon  and  stars  by  night,  guiding  this 
republic  along  a  pathway  of  honor  and  glory  to  the 
first  place  among  the  nations  of  the  earth. 

Thus  it  comes  to  pass  that  the  historian  of  to-day 
cannot  truly  describe  the  significance  of  the  birth  of 
a  race  from  the  death  of  slavery  into  the  life  and 
liberty  of  freedom  ;  but  some  elements  of  that  trans- 
formation we  even  now  may  justly  consider. 

MANHOOD    OF    THE    NEGRO. 

The  Negro  race,  by  the  emancipation  proclama- 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  369 

tion,  was  born  again  to  manhood.  Slavery  made  the 
Negro  a  chattel  ;  but  freedom  made  the  Negro  a 
human  being.  Slavery  made  him  a  thing  ;  freedom 
made  him  a  man.  On  that  first  day  of  January,  1863, 
the  manhood,  which  had  so  long  been  taken  from  the 
black  man,  was  gloriously  and  divinely  restored. 
Mr.  Lincoln  long  hesitated  regarding  the  expediency 
of  publishing  this  proclamation.  Even  nine  days 
before  the  issuance  of  the  preliminary  proclamation, 
on  September  22,  1862,  he  declared  that  such  a 
proclamation  was  inexpedient,  impracticable,  and 
impossible.  But  the  hand  of  God  was  in  this  move- 
ment. Guiding  the  hand  which  wrote  the  proclama- 
tion was  a  hand  bearing  in  its  palnr  the  print  of  a 
nail  received  on  the  cross  of  Calvary.  White  men 
declared  that  the  war  was  "  a  white  man's  war,"  but 
God  practically  declared  that  it  was  a  war  for  the 
emancipation  of  the  black  man.  Southerners  af- 
firmed that  the  war  was  for  the  maintenance  of 
State  Rights,  men  of  the  North  that  it  was  a  war 
for  the  preservation  of  the  Union  ;  but  the  great 
God  taught  us  that  the  Union  could  be  preserved 
only  as  the  slave  was  liberated,  and  that  if  slavery 
did  not  go,  the  Union  must  go.  Mr.  Lincoln 
aimed  to  preserve  the  Union,  with  or  without  slav- 
ery. Strictly  speaking,  in  his  public  acts  and  utter- 
ances up  to  this  time,  he  was  not  an  Abolitionist ; 
but  he  found  that  if  slavery  did  not  go  the  Union 
could  not  remain.  Almighty  God  crowned  the 
final  emancipation  proclamation  with  the  blessing 
of  sublime  victories  on  the  field  of  battle. 

Y 


370    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  restoration  of  the  Negro  to  a  consciousness 
of  his  manhood  was  in  harmony  with  the  teaching 
of  the  Bible.  During  the  first  half  of  this  present 
century  numerous  writers  on  ethnology,  philology, 
and  theology,  strenuously  urged  that  the  Negro  did 
not  belong  to  the  human  family.  The  cruel  treat- 
ment to  which  he  was  subjected  was  in  harmony 
with  this  unscientific,  unscriptural,  and  inhuman 
teaching.  Thank  God,  the  day  has  passed  when 
science,  falsely  so-called,  shall  be  employed  to  de- 
grade and  dehumanize  any  member  of  our  race. 
Thank  God,  the  day  has  passed  when  the  Bible  will 
be  used  as  a  missile  to  strike  the  crown  of  manhood 
from  the  noble,  though  sable,  brow  of  a  being  made 
in  the  image  of  God.  In  the  very  first  chapter  of 
Genesis  the  unity  of  the  human  race  is  implied. 
After  the  flood,  as  we  learn  by  the  eleventh  chapter 
of  Genesis,  "  the  whole  earth  was  of  one  language, 
and  of  one  speech."  This  statement  clearly  teaches 
that  there  was  but  one  nationality,  and  implies  that 
this  nationality  was  of  one  blood.  In  the  Apostle 
Paul's  magnificent  sermon  on  Mars  Hill,  he  teaches 
us  that  God  made  of  one  blood  all  nations  of  men. 
Biblical  scholarship,  it  is  safe  to  affirm,  will  never 
again  deny  the  humanity  of  the  Negro,  and  never 
again  strive  to  place  him  outside  the  human  family. 

The  belief  in  the  manhood  of  the  Negro  is  in 
harmony  with  all  that  we  know  of  the  antiquity  of 
his  race.  The  word  Ethiopia,  the  biblical  Gush,  is 
probably  used  to  describe  those  whose  color  was 
black   and  whose   blood  was  akin   to  that  of  the 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  37 1 

Negro;  the  word  Ethiopian  means  "sunburned." 
We  know  that  the  Negro  race  can  be  traced  to  a 
period  three  thousand  years  before  the  birth  of 
Christ.  Colonel  G.  W.  Williams,  to  whom  I  am 
indebted  for  several  historic  allusions,  has  shown 
in  his  "History  of  the  Negro  Race  in  America," 
that  monuments  are  found  in  a  Theban  tomb 
which  show  both  the  antiquity  and  the  dignity 
of  the  Negro  people.  There  a  Negress,  who  ap- 
parently is  a  princess,  is  represented  as  drawn  by 
oxen  whose  driver  and  groom  are  red-colored 
Egyptians. 

A  belief  in  the  manhood  of  the  Negro  is  also  in 
harmony  with  all  the  achievements  of  his  race. 
These  achievements  are  both  numerous  and  endur- 
ing. He  has  an  honorable  place  on  the  monu- 
ments, in  the  temples,  and  on  the  pyramids  of  the 
older  races  of  the  earth.  He  won  fame  in  the 
armies  of  Egypt  under  Sesostris,  and  in  the  vast 
armies  of  Xerxes.  Herodotus  makes  eighteen  of  the 
Egyptian  kings  to  have  been  Ethiopians.  Some  of 
the  idols  in  Japan  are  represented  as  woolly-haired 
Negroes  ;  so  are  some  idols  in  Siam  ;  and  Osiris  in 
Egypt  is  frequently  represented  as  being  black. 
And  in  some  countries  Vishnu  and  Buddha  are  rep- 
resented with  Negro  features.  Some  writers  have 
supposed  that  the  wife  of  Moses  was  a  Negress  ;  and 
Dr.  James  Hamilton  speaks  of  her  as  a  "sable  prin- 
cess." We  know  that  "hoary  Meroe,"  with  which 
city  Moses  as  a  soldier  was  brought  into  contact, 
was    the   chief  city  of  the  Negroes  on  the  Nile. 


372    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Before  Romulus  founded  Rome,  and  even  before 
Homer, 

The  blind  old  man  of  Scio'  s  rocky  isle, 

sang  on  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean  of  the 
glories  of  Greece,  Meroe  was  a  city  of  splendor 
and  glory.  The  private  and  public  buildings,  the 
colossal  walls  and  stupendous  gates  of  Meroe  made 
it  famous  among  the  cities  of  the  world.  Its  in- 
ventive genius  and  varied  scholarship  made  it  the 
cradle  of  civilization,  and  the  mother  of  art.  Meroe 
was  the  queenly  city  of  Ethiopia  ;  here  learning 
found  a  home ;  and  to  this  city  great  caravans 
brought  silver  and  gold,  ivory  and  frankincense 
and  other  rich  products  from  all  parts  of  Africa. 
Negroes  seem  to  have  been  the  builders  of  the  city 
of  Thebes,  with  its  hundred  gates,  its  wonderful 
temples,  and  its  glorious  palaces — Thebes  which 
supplanted  Memphis,  the  ancient  capital  of  the 
Pharaohs.  Ethiopia  probably  gave  learning  to 
Egypt,  Egypt  to  Greece,  Greece  to  Rome,  and 
Rome  to  Britain,  and  Britain  to  the  world.  Mar- 
velous was  the  Negro  civilization  of  that  early  day. 
There  are,  it  is  said,  not  fewer  than  one  hundred 
and  thirty-seven  tribes  of  Negroes  represented  in 
America  to-day.  Some  of  these,  no  doubt,  and 
perhaps  the  majority  of  them,  were  of  the  lower 
order  of  Negroes  ;  but  others  were  of  the  regal 
races  of  Africa.  Out  of  the  thirty  millions  of  souls 
who  during  three  hundred  and  sixty  years  were 
dragged  from  Africa,  and  about  one-half  of  whom 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  373 

survived  the  horrors  of  slave-ships,  many  were  the 
descendants  of  the  imperial  Ethiopians  of  "the 
brave  days  of  old."  Echoes  of  that  far-off  time 
and  of  those  superb  achievements  must  have  floated 
through  the  memory  of  slaves  as  they  toiled  under 
the  master's  lash  in  the  fields  of  the  Sunny  South. 

SOLDIERSHIP    OF    THE    NEGRO. 

The  Negro,  by  the  Emancipation  Proclamation, 
was  born  again  to  soldiership.  The  Negro  lost  his 
early  greatness  by  forgetting  God  and  practising 
idolatry.  The  Negro  was  degraded  as  the  result 
of  sin  ;  but  he  was  not  so  degraded  as  to  be  in- 
different to  the  possibilities  awaiting  human  en- 
deavor on  the  American  continent.  It  is  a  most 
interesting  fact  that  the  first  blood  shed  during  the 
American  Revolution  was  the  blood  of  a  Negro. 
There  was  much  discussion  in  those  early  days  as 
to  the  wisdom  of  arming  the  Negroes.  England 
sent  many  slaves  to  the  American  plantations,  and 
the  part  which  these  slaves  should  take  when  hos- 
tilities began  was  very  important.  It  is  instructive 
to  study  the  records  of  that  early  day  and  to  ob- 
serve the  solicitude  manifested  and  the  embarrass- 
ment experienced  by  the  American  colonists.  On 
the  second  day  of  October,  1750,  the  Boston  "Ga- 
zette" called  attention  to  a  "Runaway,"  "a  Molatto 
Fellow,  about  twenty-seven  years  old,  six  feet  two 
inches  high."  Twenty  years  later  the  name  of  this 
slave  once  more  appeared  in  the  journals  of  Boston. 
This  time  he  was  not  advertised  as  a  "  Runaway," 


374    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

but  the  papers  wrote  of  him  in  glowing  terms  as  a 
Negro  patriot,  soldier,  and  martyr.  On  March  5, 
1770,  occurred  the  Boston  Massacre.  This  manly- 
looking  fellow,  Crispus  Attucks,  was  a  commanding 
figure  among  the  irate  colonists.  As  our  Negro 
author  tells  us,  he  had  listened  to  the  fiery  elo- 
quence of  Otis,  the  convincing  arguments  of  Sewall, 
and  the  tender  pleadings  of  Belknap,  until  the  sacred 
fires  of  patriotism  burned  in  his  soul.  He  led  in 
the  bloody  drama  which  opened  an  eventful  and 
thrilling  chapter  in  American  history.  He  attacked 
the  "main-guard"  of  the  ministerial  army;  then 
Captain  Preston's  guns  were  discharged,  and  the 
brave  Attucks  went  down  before  the  terrible  fire. 
They  did  well  to  bury  him  from  Faneuil  Hall,  so 
fittingly  called  "the  cradle  of  liberty."  Four 
hearses  bore  to  one  grave  the  bodies  of  Attucks, 
Caldwell,  Gray,  and  Maverick. 

Negroes  responded  to  every  call  to  arms  from  Mas- 
sachusetts Bay  to  Lake  Champlain.  Every  North- 
ern colony  had  its  troops  of  Negroes  ;  and,  with 
the  exception  of  the  black  regiment  of  Rhode 
Island,  they  were  not  in  separate  organizations. 
At  first  only  free  Negroes  were  admitted  into  the 
army ;  but  before  the  war  closed  Negroes  were 
purchased  and  sent  into  the  war  with  the  offer  of 
freedom  and  fifty  dollars  bounty  at  the  close  of 
their  service.  At  Bunker  Hill  the  Negroes  dis- 
played bravery  of  the  highest  order  ;  and  Bancroft 
gives  just  praise  to  the  heroic  Negroes  who  partici- 
pated in  this  battle.     Major  Pitcairn,   the  gallant 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  375 

officer  of  the  British  marines,  led  the  charge  against 
the  redoubt,  shouting,  "The  day  is  ours!"  His 
presence  intimidated  many  of  the  soldiers  who  con- 
fronted him,  and  at  this  critical  moment  Peter 
Salem,  a  private  in  Col.  Nixon's  regiment  of  the 
Continental  Army,  dashed  forward  and  shot  down 
the  advancing  major.  Peter  Salem  was  then  a 
slave,  but  the  sense  of  liberty  made  him  a  hero  on 
that  historic  occasion.  Salem  Poor  was  another 
Negro  soldier  who  won  for  himself  fame  and  glory 
at  Bunker  Hill.  In  the  war  of  1812,  there  was  no 
doubt  as  to  the  help  which  the  Negroes  could 
render  in  battle.  In  the  battle  of  New  Orleans, 
in  the  battle  on  Lake  Erie,  and  in  other  of  the  great 
battles  of  the  period,  the  Negro  has  an  honorable 
place.  The  brush  of  the  painter  has  given  him  his 
deserved  share  of  praise  by  placing  him  in  the 
painting  commemorating  Perry's  victory,  the  superb 
painting  hanging  in  the  Capitol  of  the  Nation. 

In  the  great  Civil  War  he  had  his  place,  and 
won  glory  which  will  never  be  taken  from  him. 
Slavery  found  its  apologists  in  every  rank  of  society. 
Even  the  pulpit  of  Lyman  Beecher  and  that  of  the 
great  Channing  was  practically  silent  regarding  the 
sin  of  slavery.  Apologists  of  slavery  were  found  in 
Stuart  of  Andover,  in  Alexander  of  Princeton,  and 
in  scores  of  other  men  in  pulpits  and  theological 
chairs  ;  but  brave  men  were  not  wanting  who  lifted 
up  their  voices  like  trumpets  in  many  parts  of  the 
land.  Parker,  Lovejoy,  Birney,  the  immortal  John 
Brown,   Lundy,    Garrison,   Phillips,   and  a  host  of 


3/6    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

other  heroes  and  patriots  were  heard  against  the 
sin  of  slavery  and  regarding  the  hope  of  freedom. 
No  man  can  pronounce  the  names  of  Fort  Harri- 
son, Port  Hudson,  Port  Royal,  and  Fort  Wagner, 
without  recalling  the  bravery  of  Negro  troops. 

Nearly  a  decade  after  the  battle  of  Fort  Harri- 
son, September  29,  1864,  where  Negroes  made 
one  of  the  most  brilliant  charges  of  the  war,  with 
"Remember  Fort  Pillow"  as  their  battle-cry, 
General  Butler  in  Congress,  in  a  speech  on  the 
Civil  Rights  Bill,  pronounced  a  glowing  eulogy  on 
the  bravery  of  the  Negro  troops  as  he  described 
that  battle,  and  especially  the  space  of  three  hun- 
dred yards  long,  and  "  not  wider  than  the  clerk's 
desk,"  in  which  lay  the  dead  bodies  of  five  hundred 
and  forty-three  of  "  my  colored  comrades,  fallen  in 
defense  of  their  country,  who  had  offered  their 
lives  to  uphold  its  flag  and  its  honor,  as  a  willing 
sacrifice,"  We  remember,  with  special  interest, 
the  "Fifty-fourth  Massachusetts,"  whose  signal 
bravery  is  commemorated  in  the  volume  entitled 
"A  Black  Regiment."  We  cannot  forget  that  dur- 
ing the  war  for  the  Union,  including  white  officers, 
one  hundred  and  eighty-six  thousand  and  seventeen 
black  men  enlisted  in  the  service  of  the  nation,  and 
participated  in  two  hundred  and  forty-nine  battles. 
We  cannot  forget  the  blood  of  Crispus  Attucks, 
nor  that  of  Nicholas  Biddle,  a  member  of  the  first 
company  that  passed  through  Baltimore  in  April, 
1861  ;  we  cannot  forget  that  the  first  regiment  to 
enter  Petersburg  was  composed  of  Negroes  ;   we 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  377 

cannot  forget  that  the  first  troops  to  enter  Rich- 
mond were  two  divisions  of  Negroes  ;  we  cannot 
forget  that  the  last  guns  fired  at  Lee's  army  at 
Appomattox  were  fired  by  Negroes  ;  we  cannot 
forget  that  the  last  volley  of  the  war  was  fired  by 
the  colored  troops  on  May  15,  1865,  at  Palmetto 
Ranch,  Texas  ;  and  the  world  will  never  forget 
that  when  President  Lincoln  was  silent  in  death, 
a  Negro  regiment  guarded  his  remains  and  marched 
in  the  stately  procession  which  bore  the  immortal 
man  from  the  White  House.  And  the  South  and 
the  world  ought  never  to  forget  that  when  "the 
cradle  and  the  grave  were  robbed  to  furnish  men 
to  sustain  the  Confederacy  in  its  last  terrible 
struggles,"  the  wives  and  children  of  these  Con- 
federates, who  were  fighting  to  make  slavery  per- 
petual, were  committed  to  the  keeping  of  Negroes, 
and  most  loyally  and  tenderly  did  they  keep  this 
sacred  trust. 

CITIZENSHIP    OF   THE    NEGRO. 

With  the  Emancipation  Proclamation  came  the 
new  birth  of  the  Negro  to  American  citizenship. 
The  close  of  the  war  found  the  Negro  in  a  distressed 
condition.  He  was  without  experience,  without 
suitable  clothing,  without  a  home,  and  thousands 
were  without  a  name.  Their  rejoicing  over  free- 
dom was  long  and  loud,  but  then  came  the  build- 
ing up  of  a  race  under  new  conditions  and  amid 
terrific  trials.  The  period  of  reconstruction  was, 
to   a  great    degree,    a  period   of  misconstruction. 


^yS    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Evils  of  every  kind  ran  riot ;  the  Negro  was  forced 
into  positions  for  which  he  was  utterly  unfitted. 
He  was  given  the  statute  book  when  he  ought  to 
have  been  given  the  spelling-book  ;  he  was  sent  to 
the  legislature  when  he  ought  to  have  been  sent  to 
a  common  school.  It  is  easy  now  to  criticise  the 
follies  and  wrongs  of  that  disorganized  period. 
Many  of  the  South  refused  to  take  part  in  the  re- 
construction of  the  government,  and  many  who 
were  willing  to  take  part  were  unfitted  for  the  task. 
Bad  men,  both  of  the  North  and  of  the  South,  took 
advantage  of  the  situation  for  personal  gain  and  for 
political  ambition.  The  death  of  Mr.  Lincoln  made 
the  task  of  reconstruction  enormously  difficult. 
President  Johnson  was  without  the  training  and 
the  ability  of  any  sort  for  so  great  an  undertaking. 
The  government  admitted  the  Negro  to  share  the 
honors  of  citizenship,  but  like  many  white  men 
who  have  the  ballot  he  was  not  fully  qualified  to 
exercise  the  right  of  suffrage.  He  must  now,  how- 
ever, fully  qualify  himself  for  this  high  honor. 
Probably  he  will  never  be  permitted  to  exercise 
this  right,  as  the  law,  properly  interpreted,  de- 
mands, until  he  has  developed  in  knowledge,  in 
character,  and  in  the  acquisition  of  property. 

It  will  scarcely  be  denied  that  in  many  parts  of 
the  South  he  is  practically  disfranchised,  and  it  will 
scarcely  be  claimed  that  it  is  wise  now  to  insure 
him  his  rights  at  the  point  of  the  bayonet  in  the 
hands  of  United  States  troops.  The  colored  man 
must  accept  the  responsibility  as  well  as  the  hon- 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  379 

ors  of  citizenship.  He  is  henceforth  to  be  a  man 
among  men.  He  must  understand  that  no  issue 
in  State  or  national  government  is  foreign  to  him. 
He  has  already  proved  his  patriotism  for  his  native 
land,  and  already  his  life  is  undergoing  a  radical 
change.  With  citizenship  have  come  the  sacred- 
ness  of  marriage  and  the  responsibility  of  parent- 
hood. All  the  horrors  of  slavery  are  soon  to  be 
but  a  sad  and  terrible  memory,  and  already  he  is 
interested  in  the  education  of  his  children,  and  in 
preparing  competent  teachers  and  preachers  for  his 
race.  The  day  of  jubilee  over  freedom  is  giving 
place  to  the  stern  realities  of  work  which  will  fit 
him  for  that  freedom.  He  is  turning  from  his 
semi-civilization  to  the  duties  of  the  living  present 
and  the  hopes  of  the  mysterious  and  glorious  fu- 
ture. Already  he  is  learning  that  "  man  shall  not 
live  by  bread  alone."  He  is  now  passing  through 
the  fiery  trials  incident  to  freedom  and  precedent  to 
growth  in  all  the  elements  of  civilization. 

It  was  said  at  the  time  of  his  emancipation  that 
the  Negro  would  perish  in  freedom,  but  this  proph- 
ecy facts  utterly  disprove.  The  race  has  almost  dou- 
bled since  the  issuance  of  the  Emancipation  Procla- 
mation. The  time  may  yet  come  when  he  will  be 
the  most  numerous  race  on  this  continent.  It  has 
been  said  that  the  Negro  ought  to  be  deported, 
but  by  the  time  the  ships  had  returned  for  a  second 
load  the  births  would  be  greater  than  the  numbers 
the  ships  had  carried  away.  Race  prejudice  must 
give  way  as  the  Negro  develops  character  and  se- 


380    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

cures  culture  and  wealth.  Without  wealth  he  can- 
not have  leisure,  and  without  leisure  he  cannot 
fully  develop  intellectual  power,  and  without  in- 
tellectual power  he  cannot  make  needful  progress. 
We  must  recognize  his  rights  as  a  citizen.  He  is 
not  to  be  the  subject  of  pity  ;  he  simply  asks  jus- 
tice. More  he  does  not  ask  ;  less  we  ought  not  to 
give.  He  is  now  bound  up  with  us  for  weal  or 
woe  in  the  history  of  the  American  Republic.  He 
is  an  American  of  the  Americans.  Ignorant,  su- 
perstitious, and  immoral  as  many  Negroes  doubt- 
less are,  they  are  far  more  worthy  of  the  honors  of 
citizenship  than  thousands  of  priest-ridden  immi- 
grants from  countries  dominated  by  the  papacy. 
A  thousand  times  better  would  it  be  for  us  to  trust 
our  future  to  the  patriotic,  loyal,  heroic  Negro, 
than  to  the  inflammable  communist,  the  dynamite 
nihilist,  and  the  ignorant  and  un-American  Ro- 
manist 

BORN    TO    SCHOLARSHIP. 

The  Negro  has  been  born  again  to  scholarship 
also.  The  tendency  of  slavery  was  to  blot  out 
every  element  of  humanity.  Only  as  it  made  the 
Negro  less  a  man  and  more  a  brute  did  it  maintain 
its  supremacy.  There  were  affectionate  and  Chris- 
tian masters,  and  they  treated  their  slaves  with 
marked  kindness.  But  a  careful  examination  of 
their  kindness  will  show  that  it  was,  to  a  great 
degree,  such  kindness  as  would  be  shown  to  do- 
mestic animals,  rather  than  that  which  springs  from 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  38 1 

a  sense  of  brotherhood  with  the  Negro.  In  most 
cases  his  ignorance,  at  the  time  of  the  emancipa- 
tion, was  as  dense  as  the  African  forests  and  as 
black  as  his  own  skin.  Touching  is  it  to  learn  of 
his  anxious  desires  to  acquire  knowledge.  Men 
who  had  preached  the  gospel  for  fifty  years  were 
found  in  the  schools  established  by  the  noble  Gen. 
O.  O.  Howard,  by  our  grand  Home  Mission  So- 
ciety, and  by  the  various  denominations,  studying 
with  little  children  that  they  might  learn  how  to 
read  the  name  of  Christ,  who  had  bought  them 
with  his  precious  blood. 

Marvelous  are  the  possibilities  and  the  achieve- 
ments of  this  abused  race.  A  new  day  has  dawned 
upon  the  Negro  of  America  and  of  the  world.  A 
nation  has  been  born  in  a  day.  The  Negro  has 
an  inborn  love  for  music,  he  has  a  remarkable  mem- 
ory, and  an  eloquence  in  speech  that  never  fails  to 
stir  his  countrymen.  The  American  Negro  in  these 
days  is  not  the  African  Negro  in  his  degraded  days. 
The  American  Negro  is  quite  another  product.  He 
is  civilized,  Americanized,  and  largely  Christianized. 
He  is  Anglo-Saxonized  to  a  great  degree.  In  many 
cases  the  so-called  Negro  is  more  Saxon  than  Ne- 
gro. He  is  racially,  nationally,  educationally,  and 
religiously  a  new  creature.  His  actualities  are  mar- 
velous to  men  ;  his  potentialities  only  God  can 
rightly  estimate.  Our  Negro  students  are  pushing 
forward  with  a  vigor  and  success  as  inspiring  as 
wonderful.  All  the  great  colleges  of  the  North  are 
open  to  the  Negro  ;   Harvard,  Yale,  Princeton,  Chi- 


382    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

cago,  Rochester,  and  Hamilton  offer  a  helping  hand. 
There  is  no  treasury  of  wealth  in  library,  or  museum, 
or  in  brain  of  professors,  to  which  he  is  not  wel- 
come. He  has  already  won  honors  in  the  most 
famous  colleges  of  America  and  of  the  world.  He 
has  proved  his  ability  as  a  scholar  as  truly  as  his 
bravery  as  a  soldier.  He  is  climbing  up  the 
heights  of  fame  and  soon  will  stand  upon  its  sun- 
kissed  summit. 

The  schools  established  by  the  various  churches 
in  the  South  are  regenerating  the  Negro  race. 
Money  has  been  poured  with  lavish  hand  into  the 
building  and  conduct  of  these  schools.  Men  of  the 
North  have  made  their  names  immortal  because 
of  their  gifts  to  their  black  brothers  and  sisters. 
Call  the  roll  of  our  Southern  Baptist  schools  for 
the  Negro  ;  it  is  an  honored  and  immortal  roll. 
Some  of  the  noblest  men  and  women  in  the  Bap- 
tist ranks  have  associated  their  names  with  these 
schools.  Men  and  women  who  now  wear  the 
crown  of  glory,  have  found  that  crown  resplendent 
with  stars  because  of  their  work  for  their  black 
brethren.  Men  and  women  still  among  us  have 
their  names  pronounced  by  the  rising  race  of 
Negroes  with  gratitude  to  God  and  with  benedic- 
tion upon  these  noble  donors. 

A    NOBLER    CHRISTIANITY. 

The  Negro  has  also  been  born  again  to  a  nobler 
Christianity.  Many  of  the  race  were,  in  a  sense, 
unduly  religious  in  their  time  of  bondage  ;   they 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  383 

had  a  vague  faith  in  God  as  a  deliverer ;  they  had 
zeal  without  knowledge.  Many  of  them  still  have 
more  zeal  than  knowledge.  Many  have  largely 
separated  between  an  exciting  religious  experience 
and  a  practical  morality.  Many  of  them  are  to 
this  hour  largely  under  the  influence  of  African 
paganism  and  its  unwholesome  traditions.  But  a 
brighter  day  is  dawning  ;  a  brighter  day  has  already 
dawned.  This  true  Christianity  is  closely  allied  to 
the  new  scholarship  of  which  mention  has  been 
made.  The  two  cannot  be  separated.  Ignorance 
may  be  the  mother  of  gross  superstition,  but  never 
of  true  devotion.  True  scholarship  must  ever 
kindle  its  torch  at  the  cross  of  Christ ;  true  disciple- 
ship  must  ever  study  in  the  school  of  Christ,  which 
is  the  noblest  university.  But  these  colored  people 
labor  under  great  disadvantages.  Practically,  the 
great  universities  of  the  South  are  closed  against 
them  ;  practically,  many  of  the  great  trades  in  the 
North  are  closed  against  them.  They  are  a  de- 
spised race  ;  they  struggle  against  great  odds  ;  they 
are  handicapped  in  every  step  they  take.  They 
are  shut  out  from  many  profitable  trades  and  help- 
ful labor  organizations.  Many  army  officers,  when 
discussions  arose  regarding  the  recruiting  of  Ne- 
groes, declared  that  they  would  never  serve  in  the 
army  with  Negroes,  whom  they  invariably  called 
"  '^igge^'s,"  as  so  many  to  their  own  dishonor  still 
do. 

When  we  consider  their  disadvantages  we  are 
simply  amazed  at  the  progress  they  have  made. 


384    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Has  not  the  time  come  when  the  Christians  of  the 
South  may  join  hands  with  the  Christians  of  the 
North  for  a  greater  upHfting  of  the  Negro  people? 
Baptists  of  the  South  must,  and  we  beHeve  will, 
join  hands  with  their  brethren  of  the  North  for  the 
sake  of  a  common  country,  a  common  flag,  a  com- 
mon faith,  and  a  common  Lord,  to  give  the  Negro 
all  his  rights,  to  remove  from  him  all  his  disabilities, 
and  to  start  him  afresh  on  the  path  of  national  and 
Christian  progress.  Out  of  the  eight  million  Ne- 
groes in  the  South  about  one  million  five  hundred 
thousand  are  members  of  Baptist  churches.  It  is 
safe  to  say  that  about  four  millions,  or  one-half  of 
the  entire  number,  are  directly  or  indirectly  under 
the  influence  of  Baptist  teaching.  A  tremendous 
responsibility  is  thus  laid  upon  us  as  a  denomina- 
tion in  regard  to  the  Negro  race.  With  an  en- 
thusiasm for  humanity,  with  loyalty  to  our  catholic 
and  apostolic  faith  as  Baptists,  and  with  fervent 
devotion  to  Jesus  Christ,  who  died  for  men  of  all 
colors,  we  must  lay  ourselves  on  the  altar  of  serv- 
ice for  the  Negro  at  this  crucial  moment. 

THREE    REASONS. 

Three  great  objects  will  soon  be  attained  if  we 
do  our  full  duty  to  the  black  man  of  the  South. 
First,  he  will  save  us  from  the  dangers  of  sectional- 
ism. Christ  put  a  little  child  in  the  midst  of  war- 
ring disciples  to  teach  them  lessons  of  humility,  do- 
cility, and  loyalty.  God  has  put  these  millions  of 
blacks  in  the  midst  of  Baptists  North  and  South 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  385 

that  they  may  forget  their  sectionahsm  and  think 
only  of  their  duty  to  their  fellow-men  and  to  their 
common  Lord.  I  believe  in  every  drop  of  my 
blood  that  God  has  wonderful  possibilities,  nation- 
ally and  religiously,  at  this  moment  to  be  accom- 
plished through  the  instrumentality  of  the  Negro. 
Baptists  North  are  proud  of  Baptists  South  ;  those 
of  the  South  of  those  of  the  North.  At  Dallas, 
Texas,  a  committee  has  just  been  appointed  to 
consult  with  Northern  brethren  regarding  plans  for 
common  work  for  the  Negro.  This  is  a  hopeful 
indication.  We  shall  meet  this  overture  in  the 
spirit  of  love  and  loyalty  to  our  black  brothers  and 
to  our  divine  Master. 

The  time  has  surely  come  when  all  true  Baptists 
of  the  South  will  feel  that  helping  in  the  support 
of  our  Southern  schools  is  alike  their  duty  and 
their  privilege.  They  must  not,  they  will  not, 
longer  remain  even  partially  indifferent  to  the 
work  of  these  schools  ;  and  they  will  no  longer 
even  apparently  ostracise  those  who  work  for  the 
Negro.  All  their  interests  as  American  citizens 
and  as  Bible  Christians  compel  them  to  take  hold 
of  this  work  and  to  lift  the  Negro  to  his  true  place 
as  an  American  citizen  and  as  a  Bible  Christian. 
No  method  of  work  which  denies  to  the  Negro  the 
honors  of  manhood,  the  rights  of  brotherhood,  and 
the  blessings  of  Christhood  can  ever  be  considered 
by  true  brethren  either  North  or  South.  Standing 
beside  the  Negro  we  shall  declare  with  an  emphasis 
born  of  human  sympathy  and  Christian  devotion, 


386    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

that  whether  a  man  be  white  or  black,  "  a  man's  a 
man  for  a'  that."  God  grant  that  even  now  we 
may  see  the  eastern  sky  colored  with  the  crimson 
and  gold  of  a  new  day,  proclaiming  that  sectional- 
ism is  dead  and  buried  in  a  grave  so  deep  that  it 
shall  never  know  a  resurrection,  and  that  Baptists 
North  and  South  will  work  with  an  enthusiasm  and 
a  consecration  for  the  honor  of  Christ  and  for  the 
uplifting  of  the  black  man  to  the  highest  citizen- 
ship, the  truest  brotherhood,  and  the  noblest  Chris- 
tianity ! 

A  second  reason  for  doing  our  full  duty  to  the 
Negro  is  that  he  may  yet  protect  us  from  anarch, 
ism.  The  dangers  from  anarchism  to  this  republi( 
are  real  and  at  times  menacing.  Both  great  polit 
ical  parties  must  put  into  their  respective  platform* 
planks  favoring  restricted  immigration.  The  time 
was  when  we  needed  population.  We  urged  men 
of  every  class  and  from  every  country  to  come  to  this 
land.  We  looked  upon  all  foreigners  as  possible  cit- 
izens of  great  worth  ;  we  regarded  all  as  probable 
Lafayettes,  Steubens,  and  Pulaskis.  But  that  day  has 
passed  not  to  return.  We  have  known  too  much 
of  the  anti-draft  riots  of  1863,  arid  of  the  inflam- 
mable material  sent  to  us  from  Italy,  Poland, 
Hungary,  and  other  similar  countries.  We  have 
made  naturalization  laws  too  lax,  and  we  have  very 
laxly  administered  these  lax  laws.  Judges  have, 
in  the  interest  of  party  politics,  admitted  men  to 
citizenship  whose  residence  in  America  could  be 
numbered  by  hours  rather  than  by  years,     Fraudu 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  387 

lent  certificates  and  wholesale  perjuries  have  re- 
sulted in  the  naturalization  of  ignorant,  superstitious, 
and  un-American  foreigners. 

Latterly  the  quality  of  immigration  from  Sicily, 
Southern  Italy,  Russia,  Poland,  and  Hungary  has 
made  the  earlier  immigration  seem,  by  contrast, 
almost  a  desirable  acquisition.  The  time  has  come 
when  we  must  cease  to  make  America  the  dump- 
ing ground  for  the  worst  populations  of  Europe. 
We  must  teach  foreigners  that  liberty  is  not  license, 
and  that  the  hand  of  law  in  a  republic  can  be  as 
heavy,  when  lifted  against  the  lawless,  as  under  a 
monarchy.  We  must  insist  upon  it  that  we  shall 
not  import  anarchy  and  dynamite  by  shiploads. 
We  must  learn  that  Ellis  Island  is  the  place  to  begin 
when  we  would  stop  lawless  outbreaks  in  the  min- 
ing regions  of  Pennsylvania.  God  in  heaven  save 
America  from  the  floods  of  ignorance,  superstition, 
and  savagery  that  have  been  pouring  for  the  past 
few  years  into  our  beloved  land  !  We  must  insist 
upon  having  Americans  for  America. 

Just  at  this  point  the  Negro  has  a  great  mission 
to  perform.  He  is  a  true  American,  as  are  but 
few  in  this  land.  He  came  to  us  on  a  Dutch 
man-of-war  in  1619,  when  fourteen  or  twenty 
Negroes  were  offered  for  sale  to  colonists  in  Vir- 
ginia, in  August  of  that  year.  Virginia  thus, 
through  her  English  colonists,  was  the  mother  of 
slavery  as  well  as  the  mother  of  presidents.  Eng- 
land, in  all  her  colonies,  was  only  too  ready  to  use 
the  strong  hand  of  power  against  a  weaker  people. 


388    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

God  forgive  the  North  and  South,  Britain  and  her 
colonies,  for  the  sin  of  slavery  !  Negroes  are,  there- 
fore, as  I  have  said,  Americans  of  Americans.  They 
have  been  the  sufferers  of  wrong  rather  than  the 
perpetrators  of  wrong.  It  was  Irish  and  other 
mobs  which  created  the  anti-draft  riots,  which 
hung  Negroes  to  the  lamp-posts  in  the  city  of  New 
York,  and  which  destroyed  Negro  orphan  asylums. 
The  day  is  coming  when  the  Negro  will  once  more 
be  the  supporter  of  distinctively  American  institu- 
tions as  in  the  days  of  the  Revolutionary  War, 
when  he  fought  at  Bunker  Hill  ;  as  in  the  days  of 
1812,  when  he  fought  in  New  Orleans  and  on  Lake 
Erie  ;  and  as  in  the  days  of  the  Rebellion,  when 
he  baptized  American  soil  with  his  loyal  blood. 

The  Negro  has  still  a  great  mission  to  perform 
for  the  elevation  of  his  own  race,  for  upholding  the 
American  flafj,  honoring  the  American  Constitu- 
tion,  and  perhaps  protecting  America  from  anarch- 
ism, socialism,  Romanism,  and  other  isms  equally 
dangerous  and  terrific.  He  is  an  example,  where 
he  has  had  a  fair  opportunity,  of  industry,  economy, 
and  success.  During  all  these  hard  times  in  the 
city  of  New  York,  and  in  the  country  as  a  whole, 
the  number  of  Negroes  who  are  beggers  and 
paupers  has  been  gratifyingly  small.  It  fell  to  my 
lot,  as  the  pastor  of  the  Calvary  Church,  to  be  the 
channel  for  giving  supplies  during  a  period  of  six 
weeks  to  three  thousand  of  the  poor  in  New  York. 
Not  one  family  of  colored  people  asked  help  ;  to 
one  colored  widow  help  was  offered  by  me  and  not 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  389 

solicited  by  her.  Not  once,  during  all  these  try- 
ing weeks  and  months,  have  I  been  solicited  for 
alms  on  the  street  by  man,  woman,  or  child  of  the 
Negro  race,  although  I  have  been  asked  six  times 
in  a  single  walk  from  my  study  to  my  home  by 
representatives  of  another  race  and  faith. 

Third,  the  Negro  may  yet  be  our  chief  protec- 
tion against  a  dangerous  ecclesiastico-political  Ro- 
manism. It  is  a  fact  comparatively  little  known 
that  Romanism  is  responsible  for  African  slavery. 
This  fact  ought  to  be  proclaimed.  In  1442  the 
Portuguese  under  Prince  Henry  captured  some 
Moors  on  the  Atlantic  coast  of  Africa.  These  were 
afterward  exchanged  for  Negroes  and  a  quantity  of 
gold  dust,  and  soon  some  slave  ships  were  built 
and  some  Negro  slaves  were  brought  into  Spain. 
But  the  vast  territory  known  as  the  kingdoms  of 
Benin,  of  Dahomey,  and  of  Yoruba,  was  later  vis- 
ited, and  these  kingdoms  finally  gave  more  people 
into  American  slavery  than  any  other  part  of  Africa. 
These  Negro  empires  once  were  intelligent  and 
powerful.  Here  were  a  social  state  and  a  political 
government  of  an  orderly  people.  In  1485  Al- 
fonso de  Aviro,  a  Portuguese,  discovered  Benin 
and  established  settlements  of  Portuguese.  When 
he  returned  to  the  coast  of  Portugal  an  ambassador 
from  the  Negro  king  of  Benin  went  with  him  ask- 
ing for  Christian  missionaries  for  his  people.  Fer- 
nando Po  was  sent  to  the  Gulf  of  Benin.  He 
ascended  the  river  of  the  same  name  to  Gaton,  and 
there  located  a  Portuguese  colony  and  soon  estab- 


390    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

lished  the  Roman  Church.  Men  with  the  spirit  of 
the  Jesuits  of  a  later  day  followed  him,  and  at  once 
had  the  king  partly  under  their  control.  The  king 
offered  to  turn  over  all  his  subjects  to  the  Roman 
Church,  provided  the  priests  would  give  him  a 
white  wife  ;  and  their  part  of  the  contract  these 
missionaries  undertook  to  perform.  A  strong 
appeal  was  made  to  various  sisterhoods  to  furnish 
a  wife  for  the  Negro  king  in  order  to  lead  him  and 
his  people  into  the  Roman  Church,  and  one  sister 
finally  agreed  to  accept  the  hand  of  the  swarthy 
ruler.  Her  name  is  not  known,  but  surely  she 
ought  to  have  been  canonized.  The  missionaries 
worked  with  a  will,  but  sickness  and  death  swept 
away  the  Portuguese  as  with  the  fiery  breath  of 
lightning.      But  they  established  the  slave  trade. 

Soon,  however,  in  the  minds  of  these  untutored 
savages  there  was  some  contradiction  between  a 
Christian  church  and  a  slave-pen  under  one  man- 
agement. The  inhuman  treatment  given  to  the 
people  led  them  to  doubt  the  sincerity  of  the  mis- 
sionaries, and  it  is  stated  that  to-day  there  is  no 
trace  of  the  Roman  Church  in  that  country  ;  but  it 
was  there  long  enough  to  sow  the  seeds  of  one  of 
the  most  gigantic  evils  the  world  has  ever  known. 
It  laid  the  foundation  of  the  slave-trade,  whose 
cruelties  were  so  terrible  that  one's  heart  grows 
sick  as  he  reads  of  them  in  the  May  number  of  the 
"Century  Magazine."  The  Roman  Church,  in 
this  instance,  as  later  through  the  instrumentality 
of   Columbus,   showed   an   astounding    alacrity  to 


THE    REGENERATION    OF   A    RACE  39 1 

seize  innocent  savages  and  to  subject  them  to 
inhuman  slavery.  The  slave-trade,  having  been 
established  by  Roman  missionaries,  was  followed 
up  by  the  natives  themselves.  They  left  their  fish- 
nets, their  cattle,  their  fields,  and  their  villages,  and 
went  forth  to  battle  against  their  weaker  neighbors, 
and  their  prisoners  of  war  they  sold  to  slave-dealers 
for  rum  and  tobacco.  They  became  thieves  and 
murderers  in  order  to  secure  slaves  for  this  Satanic 
market.  This  was  the  real  beginning  of  African 
slavery  ;  this  was  the  first  enduring  contact  of  the 
Roman  Church  with  this  dehumanizing  crime. 

What  was  the  last  semi-official  relation  of  this 
church  to  slavery?  The  years  passed  ;  the  slaves 
groaned  and  died  in  bondage.  Chief  Justice  Mar- 
shall died  in  1835,  and  the  President  appointed 
Roger  Brooke  Taney  his  successor.  A  year  later 
the  nomination  was  confirmed  in  the  Senate.  In 
1857  the  Dred  Scott  case  was  decided.  In  that 
decision  Judge  Taney  affirmed  that  the  patriots  of 
the  Revolution  and  their  progenitors  regarded  the 
Negro  race  as  so  far  inferior  that  they  had  no 
rights  which  white  men  were  bound  to  respect. 
President  Buchanan  knew  the  decision  before  it 
was  promulgated,  and  he  shaped  his  inaugural 
address,  delivered  March  4,  1857,  accordingly. 
He  believed  that  this  decision  would  speedily  and 
finally  settle  the  whole  question  of  slavery.  He  was 
a  prophet,  for  this  decision  led,  in  no  small  part, 
to  the  Civil  War,  and  then  God  settled  the  question 
by  the  arbitrament  of  the  sword.     Judge  Taney 


392     CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

was  a  loyal  son  of  the  Roman  Church  ;  that  church 
sowed  the  seeds  of  African  slavery,  and  after  the 
lapse  of  hundreds  of  years,  in  the  person  of  this 
judge,  it  erased  the  last  trace  of  manhood,  and 
shattered,  apparently,  the  last  hope  of  freedom  on 
the  part  of  the  despised  and  hated  Negro.  The 
world  cannot  shut  its  eyes  to  these  terrible  facts,  to 
this  long  line  of  infamy  begun  in  Africa  and  ended 
in  America. 

Once  more  Romanism  is  trying  to  enslave  the 
Negro.  It  would  put  on  his  soul  the  chains  of 
ignorance  and  superstition  ;  it  would  make  him  ten- 
fold more  the  child  of  superstition,  tradition,  and 
hoodooism.  Every  instinct  of  patriotism,  every 
command  of  a  pure  Christianity,  and  every  Baptist 
obligation  call  upon  us  to  save  the  Negro  from  the 
bondage  of  Romanism.  Ethiopians  early  came  near 
to  the  divine  Lord  ;  for  as  Jesus  Christ  was  being 
led  away  to  Calvary  his  persecutors  and  crucifiers 
laid  their  hands  upon  Simon  of  Cyrene.  Many 
commentators  believe  that  he  was  a  Negro,  and 
many  of  the  most  celebrated  pictures  of  the  cruci- 
fixion represent  him  as  a  black  man,  and  give  him 
a  prominent  place  in  this  most  tragic  scene.  Bap- 
tists early  were  brought  into  contact  with  Ethio- 
pians ;  for  Philip  baptized  the  noble  treasurer  of 
Candace,  queen  of  the  Ethiopians. 

Who  to-day  will  be  the  next  American  Baptist 
who  will  make  his  name  immortal  by  generously 
endowing  some  or  all  of  our  Baptist  colored  schools 
in  the  South?     Who  will  be  the  associate  of  the 


THE    REGENERATION    OF    A    RACE  393 

noble  men  and  women  whose  honored  names  these 
institutions  now  bear?  Never  was  a  grander  op- 
portunity laid  before  the  denomination  than  the 
providence  of  God  now  gives  us  in  connection  with 
the  Negroes  of  the  South.  God  Almighty  lays 
upon  us  the  tremendous  responsibility,  and  he  offers 
us  the  golden  opportunity.  Who  to-day  will  follow 
where  God  leads  ?  Who  to-day  will  walk  by  the 
side  of  Simon  bearing  the  cross  of  Christ  and  win- 
ning the  crown  of  American  patriotism,  of  Negro 
gratitude,  and  of  divine  benediction  ? 

God  has  given  us  in  General  Morgan  a  noble 
leader  in  this  work.  A  brave  soldier,  a  trained 
educator,  a  trusted  statesman,  a  loving  brother,  a 
true  patriot,  and  a  consecrated  Christian,  God  has 
eminently  fitted  him  for  his  position.  His  superb 
service  for  the  Government,  as  the  ablest  Commis- 
sioner of  Indian  Affairs  we  have  ever  had,  grandly 
completed  his  training  for  still  greater  achieve- 
ments. He  honors  the  position  so  nobly  filled  by 
his  worthy  predecessors,  and  under  his  administra- 
tion the  American  Baptist  Home  Mission  Society 
will  do  still  grander  things  for  the  Negro,  whose 
best  interest  it  has  always  so  patriotically  and 
Christianly  sought  and  secured. 

We  are  builders  of  a  nobler  cathedral  than  that 
of  Cologne,  just  completed  after  centuries  of  patient 
waiting.  Jesus  Christ  is  the  divine-human  archi- 
tect. The  New  Testament  gives  us  the  immortal 
plans  ;  and  out  of  the  world's  quarry  we  are  hewing 
the  living  stones.      Black  as  truly  as  white  marble 


394    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and  granite  enter  into  this  noble  structure.  Silently 
it  is  going  up  in  the  sight  of  men  and  angels.  One 
day  the  capstone  will  be  laid,  and  amid  the  songs 
of  saints  and  seraphs  there  will  be  no  voices  sweeter 
than  those  of  our  black  brethren  who  so  long  illus- 
trated the  prophecy  of  Scripture,  "  Ethiopia  shall 
stretch  out  her  hands  unto  God."  Their  songs 
and  ours  shall  be,  "  Not  unto  us,  but  unto  thy  name, 
O  Jesus  Christ,  who  alone  art  worthy,  shall  be  all 
the  glory  now  and  forever."     Amen. 


XVII 

THE  TRUE  FUNCTION  OF  THE 
MINISTER/ 

THE  task  which  I  attempt  is  deHcate  and  dif- 
ficult. Various  conceptions  are  honestly- 
entertained  regarding  the  true  sphere  of  preacher 
and  pastor ;  and  these  conceptions,  doubtless, 
change  somewhat  from  year  to  year  and  perhaps 
from  decade  to  decade.  It  is  possible,  however,  to 
lay  down  a  few  general  principles  which  perhaps 
the  majority  of  pastors  in  evangelical  pulpits  will 
endorse. 

THE    MINISTER    A    STUDENT    OF    GOD'S    THOUGHTS. 

We  may  say,  in  the  first  place,  that  the  minister 
must  be  a  student  of  the  thoughts  of  God  in  their 
manifold  revelations.  He  certainly  must  know 
before  he  can  teach  ;  and  in  order  to  acquire  truth 
he  must  realize  that  he  is  a  student  in  a  wide  field 
of  knowledge.  All  knowledge  is  his  province,  so 
far  as  opportunity  will  permit  him  to  acquire  that 
knowledge.  Knowledge  gathered  from  every  quar- 
ter can  be  made  useful  in  declaring  the  glorious 
gospel  of  the  blessed  God.  Three  departments  of 
knowledge  may  here  be  stated. 

^  Delivered  at  the  Convocation  of  the  University  of  Chicago, 
October,  1896,  and  before  the  Robinson  Rhetorical  Society,  Ro- 
chester Theological  Seminary,  May  12,  1897. 

395 


396    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING.  MEN 

The  true  minister  must  be  a  student  of  God's 
thoughts  as  they  are  revealed  in  creation.  This  is 
a  vast  volume  ;  it  contains  numerous  chapters.  It 
reaches  from  sea  to  sea,  from  heaven  to  earth.  It 
vocalizes  earth  and  air,  sea  and  sky  ;  but  no  man 
can  do  more  than  master  the  alphabet  of  this  vol- 
ume. The  infinitely  great  and  the  infinitely  small 
are  equally  within  its  province.  It  demands  the 
use  of  telescope  and  microscope.  We  must  rec- 
ognize God  as  the  Author  of  creation  as  truly  as 
of  revelation,  in  the  more  technical  sense  of  that 
word.  We  have  been  unwise  in  supposing  at 
times  that  we  exalt  the  God  of  the  zvord  by  de- 
pressing the  God  of  the  world.  There  is  no  con- 
tradiction between  God's  revelations  in  the  two 
great  volumes  of  creation  and  revelation  ;  the  God 
of  Genesis  speaks  the  same  language  as  the  God 
of  geology.  There  may  be  contradictions  between 
our  interpretations  of  God's  thoughts  in  this  two-fold 
revelation  ;  but  there  is  no  contradiction  between 
the  revelations  themselves.  This  thought  is  beau- 
tifully illustrated  in  the  nineteenth  Psalm.  In  the 
first  six  verses  of  the  psalm  we  have  a  statement  of 
God's  glory  in  the  natural  creation  ;  and  beginning 
with  the  seventh  verse  we  feel  that  we  have  come 
into  a  new  atmosphere,  and  that  our  feet  are  stand- 
ing on  the  solid  rock.  That  verse  opens  with  the 
words,  "The  law  of  the  Lord  is  perfect."  We 
have  in  the  first  six  verses  God's  revelation  in  na- 
ture ;  we  now  have  God's  higher  revelation  in  the 
inspired  word,  but  both  belong  to  the  same  system 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER      397 

of  religion.  Both  illustrate  the  perfection  and 
glory  of  the  same  divine  Author.  A  true  friend  of 
religion  claims  the  glory  of  God  in  nature  as  well 
as  in  the  Bible. 

When  we  come  to  the  twelfth  verse  of  that 
psalm,  we  have  God  revealing  himself  in  the  re- 
generate soul  ;  and  the  last  verse  is  the  cry  of  God's 
redeemed  child  to  the  Creator  made  known  by  the 
works  of  his  hands  in  the  opening  verses  of  the 
psalm.  There  can  be  no  contradiction  between  a 
true  science  and  a  divine  revelation.  Science  is 
revelation,  so  far  as  it  goes.  The  whole  world  was 
once  a  thought  of  God  ;  it  is  now  God's  thought 
materialized,  incarnated,  embodied.  The  moun- 
tains are  God's  majestic  thoughts,  the  flowers  his 
beautiful  thoughts,  and  the  stars  his  brilliant 
thoughts.  The  whole  creation  is  vocal  with  his 
praise  and  resplendent  with  his  glory.  This  thought 
gives  dignity  to  all  forms  of  scientific  study.  In 
studying  chemistry  we  are  discovering  in  every  law 
of  attraction,  repulsion,  and  combination  the 
thoughts  of  God.  In  mathematics,  sines  and  co- 
sines, angles  and  triangles,  are  revelations  of  eternal 
truths  of  the  Almighty.  These  truths  are  universal 
as  gravitation  and  eternal  as  God.  Every  science, 
when  rightly  understood,  is  a  herald  of  the  thoughts 
of  God.  Other  things  being  equal,  the  devoutest 
student  must  be  the  most  accurate  student.  The 
undevout  scientist  is  unscientific.  We  have  a  right 
to  demand  of  the  student  of  music  that  he  shall  be 
in  sympathy  with   musical  thoughts,  sounds,  and 


398    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

laws.  The  same  remark  applies  to  the  student  of 
art  in  its  various  forms.  Not  less  does  it  apply  to 
the  student  of  natural  science.  No  man  can  under- 
stand the  everlasting  hills  except  he  have  moun- 
tains on  his  brain  ;  no  man  can  fully  appreciate  the 
sea  except  he  have  oceans  in  his  soul ;  no  man  can 
study,  in  the  best  sense,  any  department  of  nature, 
except  he  be  in  sympathy  with  the  Creator  who 
sits  as  King  in  nature's  vast  realm. 

The  true  minister  must  be  a  student  of  God's 
thoughts  as  they  are  revealed  in  the  inspired  rec- 
ord which  we  call  the  Bible.  For  its  fullest  study, 
and  even  its  partial  mastery,  a  vast  and  varied  degree 
of  equipment  is  required.  The  student  must  know 
the  languages  in  which  God's  thoughts  were  earliest 
given  to  men.  He  must  understand  the  terminus 
a  quo  and  teiDivins  ad  qticjn  of  each  book  in  the 
library  which  we  call  the  Bible.  But  most  of  all 
must  he  be  in  sympathy  with  the  spiritual  atmos- 
phere which  pervades  this  old  book.  Only  spirit- 
ual men  can  truly  understand  spiritual  things. 
We  know  that  God  is  a  spirit,  and  we  know  also 
that  only  those  who  possess  purity  of  heart  can  see 
God.  This  statement  is  both  scientific  and  scrip- 
tural. Every  science  has  secrets  which  only  its 
loving  students  can  discover.  It  has  occult  prop- 
erties and  affinities  which  no  novice  can  master ; 
not  otherwise  is  it  with  the  Christian  revelation. 
Sir  Isaac  Newton  was  right  when  he  said  to  Dr. 
Halley,  a  man  of  science,  but  religiously  an  unbe- 
liever, "  I  am  glad  to  hear  you  speak  about  astron- 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER      399 

omy  and  mathematics,  for  you  have  studied  and  you 
understand  them  ;  but  you  should  not  talk  of  Chris- 
tianity, for  you  have  not  studied  it."  We  are  told 
in  Scripture  that,  "  He  that  is  spiritual  judgeth  all 
things."  Often  a  believer  on  his  knees  can  see 
farther  than  a  philosopher  on  tiptoe.  Locke  has 
rightly,  said,  "  It  needs  a  sunny  eye  to  see  the 
sun  "  ;  Goethe  also  has  expressed  a  similar  thought ; 
and  we  well  know  that,  "  the  secret  of  the  Lord  is 
with  them  that  fear  him." 

We  ought  to  be  very  slow  in  affirming,  or  per- 
mitting others  to  affirm,  that  there  are  contradic- 
tions between  the  teachings  of  God's  two  great 
revelations.  There  is  a  realm  in  which  the  natural 
and  what  we  call  the  supernatural  are  one  and  the 
same  thing.  The  Bible  never  contrasts  the  natural 
with  the  supernatural  ;  that  latter  term  is  of  human 
and  not  of  divine  origin.  The  contrast  in  the  Bible 
is  always  between  the  natural  and  the  spiritual. 
All  the  discoveries  of  modern  science  are  making 
it  easier  than  ever  before  to  believe  in  spiritual 
realities.  There  is  really  neither  small  nor  great 
with  God.  The  universality  and  invariability  of 
law  once  affirmed  in  a  triumphant  tone  by  unbe- 
lievers and  heard  with  timidity  by  believers,  really 
make  it  easier  than  ever  before  to  believe  in  God. 
Back  of  all  forms  of  evolution  is  God  as  the  great 
Evolver ;  nothing  can  be  evolved  which  was  not 
first  involved.  Back  of  all  forms  of  order  is  God 
as  the  divine  Ordainer  ;  back  of  all  law  is  God  as 
the   great  Lawgiver.      Law  is  not  a  motor,  but  a 


400    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

motion  ;  not  a  force,  but  a  form  ;  not  an  actor,  but 
an  action  ;  and  not  a  power,  but  a  process.  We 
do  not  eliminate  God  by  putting  him  farther  back 
in  the  Hne  of  development.  Law  is  only  a  name 
which  we  give  to  the  manner  in  which  we  have 
observed  some  force  to  act.  If  the  force  is  phys- 
ical, we  call  it  a  physical  law  ;  if  it  is  moral,  we 
call  it  a  moral  law. 

There  may  be  nothing  miraculous,  in  the  sense 
of  being  contrary  to  natural  law,  in  the  miracles 
recorded  in  the  Bible.  The  discovery  of  electricity 
in  its  various  applications  is  almost  marvelous. 
What  to-day  is  a  truism,  was  yesterday  an  unknown 
phenomenon.  The  finger  of  God  seems  to  drive 
the  trolley  cars  through  our  streets.  To-day 
thoughts  instantaneously  leap  from  America  to 
England,  passing  thousands  of  miles  under  the 
mighty  deep.  This  daily  occurrence  once  would 
have  been  called  a  miracle  ;  but  it  is  simply  a 
utilization  of  a  perfect  natural  law.  We  are  greatly 
in  need  of  a  new  definition  of  miracles.  To-day 
Paris  speaks  to  London  and  to  Brussels  through 
the  telephone  ;  to-day  New  York  speaks  to  Chicago, 
in  round  numbers  one  thousand  miles  away,  through 
the  telephone.  The  opening  of  this  long-distance 
telephone  marked  an  era  in  the  history-  of  inven- 
tion. The  utmost  pains  were  taken  in  the  con- 
struction of  this  telephonic  line.  A  cornet  was 
brought  to  the  receiver  in  New  York,  and  every 
note  was  heard  in  Chicago,  a  thousand  miles  away. 
An  editor  in  Chicago  dictated  through  this  telephone 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     4OI 

an  editorial  to  a  stenographer  in  Brooklyn.  The 
presses  in  Brooklyn  were  soon  printing  this  editorial, 
and  the  noise  of  the  presses  was  heard  in  Chicago. 
Had  a  man  affirmed  these  facts  one  hundred  years 
ago  he  would  have  been  burned  as  one  who  had 
uncanny  relations  with  Satan. 

This  telephone  makes  it  easy  to  believe  that  God 
can  hear  and  answer  prayer.  If  a  man  in  New 
York  can  talk  to  Chicago,  not  contrary  to  natural 
law  but  in  perfect  harmony  therewith,  who  will 
dare  say  that  man  cannot  talk  to  God  in  perfect 
harmony  with  natural  law  ?  A  decade  ago  we 
would  have  said  with  the  utmost  emphasis  that  no 
man  could  talk  to  his  fellow-man  a  thousand  miles 
away  ;  we  would  have  said,  "  it  is  utterly  contrary 
to  all  natural  law."  It  was  then  contrary  to  natural 
law,  as  we  knew  natural  laws  ;  but  we  did  not  then 
know  all  natural  laws — we  do  not  know  all  such 
laws  now.  When  a  man  says,  "  God  cannot  hear 
prayer,"  we  may  rightly  ask,  "  How  do  you  know?  " 
The  time  may  come  when  we  shall  understand  that 
the  act  of  hearing  and  answering  prayer  is  in  as 
perfect  harmony  with  natural  law  as  the  use  of  the 
telephone  is  to-day.  Telepathy  may  yet  explain 
thousands  of  secrets  which  are  now  profoundly 
mysterious.  Marvelous  laws  of  locomotion  are  yet 
to  be  discovered,  laws  whose  discovery  will  enable 
us  to  girdle  the  earth  in  a  few  days  and  perhaps  to 
cross  broad  oceans  in  a  few  hours.  We  have 
brought  lightning  from  the  clouds  ;  we  use  the  sun 
to  print  photographs  ;  we  are  able  to  register  the 


402    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

amount  of  heat  generated  by  the  flash  of  a  firefly  ; 
and  we  may  yet  be  able  to  tell  mechanically,  as 
Dr.  Holmes  has  suggested,  the  amount  of  good  or 
evil  which  men  exert  over  those  who  come  near 
them.  Our  discoveries  are  so  wonderful  that  they 
have  ceased  to  excite  wonder.  Who  will  dare  say 
what  God  can  do  without  violating  law,  when  man 
has  accomplished  such  wonders  in  harmony  with 
the  higher  laws  lately  discovered  ? 

Surely  it  is  not  wonderful  that  God  could  arrest 
the  course  of  a  river  like  the  Jordan,  when  man 
can  change  seas  to  fields  in  Holland.  Surely  it  is 
not  so  wonderful  that  the  Creator  of  heaven  and 
earth  should  cause  the  walls  of  Jericho  to  fall,  and 
that,  perhaps,  by  perfectly  natural  means,  pressing 
into  his  service  laws  with  whose  existence  and  oper- 
ations we  are  not  familiar,  when  a  little  girl  by  touch- 
ing a  button  caused  an  explosion  of  the  rocks  in 
the  East  River  near  New  York  ;  or  when  by  the 
same  means  one  could  cause  an  explosion  to-day 
which  would  lay  Chicago,  New  York,  Paris,  or  Lon- 
don in  ruins.  Surely  it  is  not  so  wonderful  that  our 
inmost  thoughts  should  be  read  by  God  when  the 
X-ray  can  photograph  a  coin  in  a  pocket-book  within 
a  traveling  bag.  A  few  years  ago  the  new  photog- 
raphy would  have  been  said  to  be  against  all  the 
laws  of  nature.  Who  could  photograph  through 
a  plank  ?  Impossible  !  Then  came  a  quiet,  plod- 
ding German  ;  and  from  his  obscurity  he  flashed 
the  Roentgen  ray  upon  the  world,  and  new  laws 
of  nature  were  discovered. 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     4O3 

Two  men  to-day,  one  an  East  Indian,  the  other 
partly  Italian  and  partly  English,  are  teaching  the 
world  the  possibility  of  telegraphing  without  wires  ; 
and  soon  the  new  telegraphy  will  take  its  place 
alongside  of  the  new  photography  as  among  the 
wonders  of  the  world,  which  will  soon  cease  to  be 
wonderful  because  of  their  familiarity.  Soon  all 
our  senses  will  be  vastly  quickened  and  multiplied, 
and  we  shall  see  thousands  of  things  now  unseen 
and  hear  thousands  of  things  now  unheard  ;  and 
the  whole  world  will  be  enlarged,  ennobled,  and 
beautified  ;  and  we  shall  become  more  like  God  in 
his  omniscience  than  once  we  thought  it  reverent  to 
dream,  to  hope,  or  to  pray.  Natural  law  may  yet 
show  that  the  biblical  narrative  of  the  fish  swal- 
lowing Jonah  is  not  only  historical  but  strictly 
scientific  ;  cases  of  catalepsy,  hypnotism,  ecstasy, 
and  trance  are  almost  equally  mysterious ;  and 
well-attested  cases  of  hibernation,  or  estivation,  are 
certainly  not  less  inexplicable,  according  to  the 
laws  of  nature  with  which  we  are  now  familiar. 
Who  are  we  that  we  talk  about  what  God  can  or 
cannot  do  ?  Who  are  even  our  greatest  scientists 
who  presume  to  deny  what  greater  scientists  may 
accomplish  in  the  near  future  ? 

It  may  be  that  all  the  miracles  performed  by 
our  Lord  will  yet  be  seen  to  be  in  perfect  harmony 
with  natural  laws,  but  laws  with  which  at  present 
we  are  not  familiar.  In  changing  water  into  wine, 
and  in  multiplying  the  loaves  of  bread,  our  Lord 
simply  did  what  nature  is  doing  constantly.     Our 


404    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

Lord  accelerated  the  ordinary  natural  processes. 
His  unusual  acts  certainly  were  not  co7itra-na.tura.\, 
even  though  we  may  say  that  they  were  supra — 
supernatural.  The  man  who  opposes  a  divine  rev 
elation  because  of  its  affirmations  regarding  natural 
phenomena,  might  with  equal  propriety  oppose  the 
affirmations  of  modern  science  regarding  any  phe- 
nomenal events  with  which  he  did  not  chance  to 
be  familiar.  All  true  science  lays  its  crown  at  the 
feet  of  the  Almighty  Creator ;  all  true  science  is 
the  handmaid  of  divine  revelation.  In  the  presence 
alike  of  true  science  and  divine  revelation,  human 
ignorance  should  be  modest,  obedient,  and  reverent. 
The  true  student  of  the  thoughts  of  God  will  re- 
gard the  book  of  nature  and  the  book  of  inspiration 
as  revelations  from  the  hand  of  the  same  divine 
Author.  The  day  is  coming,  I  firmly  believe,  when 
the  perfect  Jiarmonization  of  all  the  revelations  in 
these  two  volumes  will  be  conspicuously,  gloriously, 
and  divinely  manifested  to  all  students  of  both 
volumes. 

The  true  minister  will  be  a  student  of  the  thoughts 
of  God  as  they  are  revealed  in  history.  All  history 
is  a  revelation  in  time  of  the  thoughts  of  God  in 
eternity.  It  is  an  unfoldment  before  the  eyes  of 
men  of  the  purposes  of  the  Almighty.  No  man 
can  write  an  intelligent  history  of  the  human  race 
and  leave  out  Jesus  Christ.  As  well  might  a  man 
attempt  to  write  a  treatise  on  astronomy  and  leave 
out  the  natural  sun.  Christ's  cradle  and  cross  are 
the  pivotal  points  around  which  the  great  events  of 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     405 

histoiy  revolve.  Toward  his  birth  historic  events 
previous  to  his  coming  converged  ;  from  it  since 
his  coming  they  have  diverged.  The  pierced  hand 
of  Jesus  Christ  is  on  the  helm  of  the  universe. 
We  have  too  much  relegated  God  to  distant  lands 
and  remote  times.  We  often  forget  that  he  is  as 
truly  in  the  world  to-day  as  he  ever  was  in  the 
past.  Current  events  are  ordered  of  God  as  truly 
as  were  the  historic  movements  recorded  in  the 
Bible  in  connection  with  the  names  of  the  greatest 
patriarchs,  prophets,  and  apostles.  We  can  readily 
see  the  figure  of  the  web  in  the  loom  of  current 
history ;  but  we  often  fail  to  see  the  hand  of  God 
behind  the  loom  guiding  all  its  movements  and 
shaping  all  the  patterns  which  it  weaves.  We 
need  constantly  to  remember  the  words  of  Lowell : 

Behind  the  dim  unknown, 
Standeth  God  within  the  shadows,  keeping 
Watch  above  his  own. 

We  are  in  need  of  a  lectureship  on  the  divine  mean- 
ing of  current  events.  We  need  a  professorial  or 
ministerial  chair  for  the  interpretation  of  the  voices 
of  God  in  the  events  of  the  week.  God  is  speak- 
ing to  the  nations  to-day  on  the  banks  of  the 
Bosphorus,  the  Ganges,  and  the  Indus,  in  Japan, 
in  China,  and  in  many  of  the  islands  of  the  sea,  as 
well  as  in  our  own  beloved  land,  as  truly  as  he 
ever  spake  from  Sinai  or  from  the  mount  of  Beati- 
tudes, No  true  minister  can  afford  to  be  indif- 
ferent to  these  divine  voices.     We  have  too  often 


406    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

neglected  them  and  so  have  failed  to  shape  our 
course  in  harmony  with  the  divine  thought  of  the 
hour.  These  are  marvelous  times  in  the  history  of 
the  human  race  ;  we  are  making  history  with  greater 
rapidity  now  than  ever  before  since  the  creation  of 
man.  May  God  help  us  to  hear  his  foot-beats  and 
to  obey  his  divine  voice  in  these  closing  days  of 
the  world's  most  wonderful  century ! 

THE    MINISTER    A    PROPHET    OF    GOD'S    THOUGHTS, 

The  true  minister,  in  the  second  place,  is  a 
prophet  of  the  thoughts  of  God  as  manifoldly  re- 
vealed by  God,  and  prayerfully  received  by  the 
minister  as  a  reverent  student.  The  true  minister 
is  not  a  priest.  The  word  priest  should  never  be 
used  as  applying  to  a  minister,  except  in  the  broad 
sense  that  all  God's  children  are  priests  unto  God. 
When  used  by  the  Roman  Church  the  word  is 
consistent  with  the  fundamental  idea  of  that  church 
in  its  conception  of  the  mass  as  a  sacrificial  offering  ; 
but  when  used  by  Protestants,  who  deny  the  sacri- 
ficial character  of  the  mass,  the  word  is  inconsistent 
as  well  as  unscriptural.  It  is  unscriptural  when 
used  by  the  Romanist,  but  it  is  both  inconsistent 
and  unscriptural  when  used  by  the  Protestant.  It 
is  surprising  that  so  many  fag-ends  of  popery  are 
still  found  in  Protestant  creeds  ;  indeed,  it  is  not 
too  much  to  say  that  remnants  of  heathenism  are 
still  found  in  some  Christian  creeds.  The  idea  of 
the  priesthood  ought  to  be  utterly  foreign  to  all 
conceptions  of  the  duties  and  functions  of  the  Chris- 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     4O7 

tian  minister.  The  priest  in  the  old  dispensation 
occupied  a  place  in  many  respects  very  much  lower 
than  that  of  the  prophet.  The  priest  was  only  an 
ecclesiastical  butcher.  His  duties  required  no  such 
intellectual  training  and  no  such  spiritual  exaltation 
as  those  of  the  prophet.  His  work  was  relatively 
coarse  and  rude,  and  was  possessed  of  elements  of 
vulgarity  and  cruelty ;  but  the  functions  of  the 
prophet  were  high,  refined,  heroic,  and  spiritual  as 
those  of  the  priest  never  could  be.  It  is  true  that 
the  dynasty  of  the  priests  began  early  and  contin- 
ued long,  and  still  lingers  both  in  Judaism  and 
Christianity.  Nevertheless  the  /unctions  of  the 
priesthood  were  precisely  what  I  have  represented 
them  to  be. 

The  prophet,  on  the  contrary,  was  the  reformer 
in  Israel.  In  popular  estimation  the  foretelling  of 
future  events  is  the  chief  characteristic  of  prophecy  ; 
but  this  is  not  the  dominant  attribute  of  the  Hebrew 
prophet.  This  is  not  the  true  thought  of  the  He- 
brew word  nabi,  neither  of  the  Greek  word  prop  he  tcs. 
These  words  have  a  much  more  comprehensive 
meaning.  The  nabi  is  the  man  who  speaks  in  the 
name  and  by  the  authority  of  God  ;  he  is,  if  we 
may  so  say,  the  voice  of  God  to  man.  The  word 
nabi,  is  derived  from  a  word  meaning  "  to  bubble 
forth"  like  a  fountain.  He  was  often  known  by 
his  ecstatic  utterances.  The  verb  which  we  trans- 
late "to  prophesy"  was  occasionally  used  in  the 
sense  of  ecstasy  amounting  to  madness.  The 
prophet  is  a  fore-teller  ;  he  is  also  a  "  forth-teller  "  ; 


408    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

and,  still  more  exactly,  he  is  a  "  for-teller,"  that  is 
a  spokesman.  In  the  time  of  Samuel  this  office 
was  recognized  as  belonging  to  a  special  class  of 
men.  There  were  schools  of  the  prophets  in  which 
a  distinct  life  was  lived  and  a  special  discipline  was 
given.  Like  Orientals  generally,  when  they  be- 
lieved they  were  under  supernatural  influences, 
these  students  were  often  wrought  up  to  a  degree  of 
ecstatic  excitement  which  expressed  itself  in  wild 
dance  and  profuse  gesticulation. 

Much  as  the  Roman  Church  has  exalted  the 
priestly  character  of  her  ministers,  she  has  not  been 
indifferent  to  their  prophetic  character  as  preachers 
of  the  gospel.  We  know  that  the  mass,  according 
to  the  theory  of  the  Roman  Church,  is  the  very 
heart  of  the  entire  system.  This  "  real  though 
unbloody  offering"  is  the  soul  of  the  Roman  faith. 
But  no  one  can  read  the  history  of  that  church 
without  discovering  the  power  of  its  Dominican, 
Redemptorist,  Paulist,  and  other  preachers  of  still 
other  orders.  Some  of  these  preachers  undergo  a 
disciplinaiy  training  of  the  most  rigid  character. 
The  students  in  our  Protestant  theological  semi- 
naries know  nothing  of  a  discipline  so  prolonged, 
so  varied,  and  so  exacting  as  that  to  which  some  of 
these  preachers  are  subjected.  Thus  we  see  that 
even  the  Roman  Church,  exalting  as  it  does  the 
significance  of  the  mass,  cannot  afford  entirely  to 
depress  the  importance  of  the  pulpit  and  the  dig- 
nity of  the  minister  as  the  prophet  of  God. 

The  true  distinction  now  made  between  prophet 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     4O9 

and  priest  indicates  the  necessity  of  differences  in 
education,  according  to  the  recognition  of  the  dif- 
ferences between  the  respective  duties  of  priest  and 
prophet.  The  ordinary  priest  need  not  be  a  man 
of  broad  education.  He  has  only  to  follow  a  pre- 
scribed ritual  ;  he  simply  has  to  be  familiar  with 
times  and  seasons,  and  with  various  details  of 
priestly  ceremonies.  Priests  may  be,  as  all  minis- 
ters have  unfairly  been  called,  simply  christening, 
marrying,  and  burying  machines.  It  is  meet  that 
the  priest  have  a  reasonable  degree  of  social  cul- 
ture, that  he  may  discharge  his  ritualistic  functions 
with  some  element  of  aesthetic  propriety ;  but  his 
sphere  is  essentially  narrow.  The  conception  here 
given  of  the  work  of  the  minister  has  its  influence 
also  upon  character.  The  nature  of  the  service 
rendered  by  the  priest  is  not  materially  injured  in 
its  perfunctory  character  by  any  moral  defects  on 
the  part  of  the  performer.  The  prophet,  on  the 
other  hand,  stands  out  in  a  vastly  different  light. 
He  is  to  be  the  master  of  all  knowledge  ;  he  is  to 
touch  life  at  every  possible  point.  He  should  be 
a  man  and  a  king  among  men.  He  must  declare 
the  truth  with  absolute  fearlessness  and  with  the 
inherent  authority  which  truth  evermore  gives  to  its 
proclamation.  All  knowledge  must  be  his  prov- 
ince. 

This  conception  of  the  ministry  shows  that  we 
want  no  "short-cut"  courses  into  its  dignities  and 
duties.  Never  were  the  demands  of  the  prophetic 
ministry  so  great  as  they  are  to-day  ;  never  before 


410    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

was  the  competition  so  terrific.  The  minister  must 
compete  with  the  Sunday  newspaper,  with  Sunday- 
amusements  in  many  cities,  and  with  social  attrac- 
tions in  many  homes,  and  with  all  forms  of  intel- 
lectual attractiveness  in  public  and  private  libraries. 
Boy  preachers  seldom  become  men  preachers. 
The  inevitable  penalty  of  undue  precocity  is 
speedy  decay.  The  pastor  is  like  a  man  on  a 
bicycle,  he  must  go  on,  or  very  soon  go  off.  He 
must  grow  up  or  down.  No  man  can  afford  to 
enter  the  ministry  to-day  with  any  kind  of  handi- 
cap which  he  can  by  any  possibility  remove.  The 
young  minister  is  serving  God  when  he  is  studying 
for  fuller  service  ;  he  is  in  the  work  when  he  is  pre- 
paring for  the  work.  We  want  no  kindergarten 
theological  seminaries. 

As  a  true  prophet  of  God  the  minister  will 
patiently  acquire  and  powerfully  declare  the  truth 
of  God.  He  will  understand  that  the  best  way  to 
preach  down  error  is  to  preach  up  truth.  No 
prophet  has  a  right  to  preach  his  doubts.  If  a 
pastor  has  doubts,  let  him  tell  them  to  God  ;  if  he 
has  truths,  let  him  declare  them  to  men.  Men 
have  doubts  enough  of  their  own  without  getting 
an  additional  supply  from  preachers.  No  man  has 
a  right  to  preach  his  unverified  thinking  and  his 
untested  speculations.  The  work  of  the  merely 
destructive  critic  is  comparatively  easy  and  is  cor- 
respondingly worthless.  It  requires  but  little 
talent  to  destroy.  A  child  or  an  idiot  with  a  knife 
or  a  hammer,  in  a  gallery  of  paintings  or  a  hall  of 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     4II 

statuary,  could  destroy  more  in  an  hour  than  a 
Raphael  or  an  Angelo  could  create  in  a  lifetime. 
We  believe  firmly  in  the  imperial  power,  resistless 
majesty,  and  divine  glory  of  truth.  We  want 
truth  ;  we  want  nothing  but  the  truth  ;  and,  as  far 
as  possible,  the  whole  truth.  No  true  prophet  of 
God  ever  fears  truth,  from  whatever  quarter  it 
comes  and  by  whatsoever  messenger  it  is  brought. 
He  welcomes  truth  as  the  child  of  God  and  the 
daughter  of  eternity  ;  but  he  must  be  sure  that 
it  is  truth,  and  not  some  specious  error  or  half 
truth  which  he  thus  welcomes.  No  man  has  a  right 
to  pull  the  roof  off  my  house,  even  though  it  be 
only  a  thatched  roof,  unless  he  has  a  better  roof 
with  which  he  will  immediately  cover  the  exposed 
walls.  We  are  not  primarily  to  distinguish  between 
new  theology  and  old  theology,  as  if  this  distinc- 
tion were  of  any  great  value  ;  what  we  want  is  the 
true  theology,  whether  it  be  new  or  old.  Let  us 
patiently  wait  until  our  theories  are  verified.  We 
need  not  oppose  unverified  theories.  If  still  un- 
verified they  are  unworthy  of  our  opposition  ;  if 
verified  we  would  be  unworthy  of  our  office  did  we 
then  manifest  opposition.  The  only  way  to  drive 
out  darkness  is  to  let  in  light ;  the  best  way  to  keep 
chaff  out  of  the  measure  is  to  fill  it  with  wheat. 
We  ought  never  to  raise  the  devil  unless  we  are 
sure  we  can  speedily  lay  him  ;  we  ought  never  to 
challenge  him  unless  we  are  prepared  to  give  him  a 
deadly  lunge. 

The  true  prophet  will  avail  himself  of  the  most 


412    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

far-reaching  results  of  truth  in  every  department  of 
inquiry.  He  is  wilHng  to  let  every  system,  every 
creed,  every  prejudice  go  if  it  is  not  concordant 
with  truth.  He  will  desire  expert  knowledge 
wherever  it  can  be  found,  but  he  must  not  implic- 
itly trust  the  deliverance  of  the  so-called  authori- 
tative experts.  Many  experts  are  almost  necessar- 
ily narrow,  and  some  of  them,  while  loudly  declar- 
ing their  liberality,  become  apostles  of  bigotry. 
One  turns  to  a  volume  bearing  a  well-known  title 
and  an  authoritative  name  ;  he  there  finds  a  con- 
clusion reached  and  perhaps  defiantly  affirmed. 
He  is  disposed  a  pnma  vista  to  accept  this  conclu- 
sion as  the  last  word  that  can  authoritatively  be 
spoken  on  the  subject,  but  his  curiosity  is  somewhat 
excited  and  he  goes  back  of  the  conclusion  so 
pleasantly  or  so  positively  announced,  to  discover 
the  premises  laid  down  and  the  process  of  reasoning 
pursued.  He  immediately  observes  that  there  is  a 
marvelous  hiatus,  an  impassable  gulf  between  the 
premises  laid  down  and  the  conclusion  reached. 
He  is  startled  ;  he  feels  that  he  has  been  victimized. 
With  all  due  modesty  he  knows  that  he  can  do  a 
little  reasoning  himself,  and  that  the  conclusion 
reached  by  his  author  by  no  legitimate  processes  of 
ratiocination  is  deducible  from  the  premises.  The 
reasons  assigned  are  utterly  inadequate  to  the  con- 
clusion affirmed.  The  true  prophet  in  the  pulpit 
must,  with  all  modesty,  be  himself  an  expert  in 
certain  departments  of  knowledge  ;  and  he  must 
limit  the  authority  of  other  experts  to  the    exact 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER      413 

dimensions  of  their  own  domain  of  knowledge. 
He  must  also,  in  some  sense,  be  an  expert  of  the 
experts,  knowing  the  department  in  which  each  ex- 
pert is  an  authority,  and  so  classifying  the  experts 
and  giving  them  only  the  weight  to  which  their 
special  learning  entitles  them.  The  critics  of  to- 
day are  destroying  the  critics  of  yesterday.  Pro- 
fessor Sayce  has  recently  affirmed  that  the  spade  is 
to  demolish  many  of  the  conclusions  of  philology  ; 
that  the  tablets  in  the  main  establish  the  traditional 
rather  than  the  modern  critical  view  of  the  histori- 
cal trustworthiness  of  the  Old  Testament  records  ; 
that  he  has  come  utterly  to  disbelieve  in  the  later 
views  of  the  composition  of  the  Pentateuch  ;  that 
he  believes  it  belongs  to  the  Mosaic  age  and  was 
written  chiefly  by  Moses  ;  that  the  literary  analysis 
of  the  Bible  is  an  unsafe  method  of  reaching  re- 
sults, and  that  he  mistrusts  the  conclusions  of  the 
higher  critics.  Professor  Harnack  has  also  recently 
uttered  his  protest  against  many  of  the  conclusions 
of  modern  biblical  criticism  and  in  favor  of  the 
traditional  view.  There  are  few  Old  Testament 
critics  in  our  day  more  thorough  and  independent 
than  Professor  Klostermann,  of  the  University  of 
Kiel.  Yet  he,  on  purely  critical  grounds,  sharply 
opposes  the  reconstruction  scheme  of  the  Penta- 
teuch made  by  Wellhausen  and  his  school.  Klos- 
termann is  a  critic  of  an  advanced  character  as 
compared  with  Zatin,  of  Stuttgart,  Rupprecht, 
and  others  of  their  consei'vative  type  ;  but  he  in- 
sists that  both  the  methods  and  manners  of  Well- 


414    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR   THINKING    MEN 

hausen  are  utterly  wrong.  He  has  in  a  series  of 
long,  detailed,  and  able  articles  impeached  this 
style  of  modern  criticism.  These  articles  were 
published  in  the  '' Ncuc  Kircliliclic  Zeitsclirift.'' 
It  is  an  interesting  conflict,  this  destruction  of 
critics  by  critics.  Scientific  experts,  in  the  light  of 
their  blunders,  have  become  much  more  modest 
than  were  their  fathers.  Some  biblical  experts 
have  not  yet  acquired  the  grace  of  modesty  to  the 
same  degree  as  their  scientific  brethren.  Many 
prophets  of  God  can  stand  with  open  face,  hand, 
and  heart,  calmly  waiting  for  and  rejoicing  in 
truth  while  the  critics  are  destroying  one  another 
in  the  biblical  arena.  The  prophet  may  wait, 
knowing  that  though  nothing  but  the  disjecta  vicvi- 
bra  of  the  critics  may  remain,  the  truth  in  its  per- 
fect symmetry,  spotless  purity,  and  radiant  splen- 
dor, will  finally  appear.  Let  no  true  student  of 
God's  word  and  church  be  alarmed.  Some  un- 
sightly scaffolds  are  coming  down  ;  let  them  fall. 
The  temple  of  truth  in  its  beauty,  perfection,  and 
divinity  is  all  the  more  transcendently  and  divinely 
revealed. 

The  criticism  which  has  arisen  in  recent  years 
regarding  Moses  and  the  Pentateuch  is  similar  to 
that  which  arose  years  ago  regarding  the  existence 
of  Homer,  and  the  historical  reality  of  his  author- 
ship of  the  "Iliad"  and  the  "Odyssey."  There 
have  been,  as  we  all  remember,  several  critical 
periods  regarding  him  and  his  writings.  Heyne, 
Wolf,  and  Niebuhr  indulged  themselves  in  several 


THE   TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     415 

varieties  of  historical  skepticism.  They  reduced 
Homer,  as  well  as  Cadmus  and  Hercules,  to  mere 
"symbols."  It  has  been  claimed  at  different  times 
that  Homer  was  merely  a  name  given  to  the  ideal 
patron  of  an  association  of  poets  (Homeroi).  Some 
made  the  word  "  Homeros  "  mean  "hostage,"  but 
others  supposed  that  its  earlier  meaning  was  "one 
who  connects  or  combines,"  and  so  was  analogous 
to  that  of  Yyasa  (collector),  the  name  given  to 
the  compiler  of  the  Hindu  Vedas  and  Puranas. 
Others  gave  the  name  the  significance  of  "  counsel- 
lor," others  "  follower,"  and  still  others  dismem- 
bered the  name,  making  it  mean,  "  one  who  does 
not  see,"  referring  to  the  legend  of  the  poet's 
blindness. 

In  support  of  the  opinion  that  Homer  was  not  a 
real  person,  but  that  his  poems  were  handed  down 
by  a  generation  of  rhapsodists  or  professional  min- 
strels, it  was  said  that  no  one  could  remember  and 
recite,  in  the  absence  of  writing,  poems  of  so  great 
a  length.  Before  the  days  of  Wolfe,  several  scholars 
entertained  these  views.  But  we  know  that  in  the 
early  days  in  Scotland  bards  would  recite  legends 
and  poems  by  the  hour  and  evening  after  evening. 
Just  when  this  argument  as  to  the  impossibility  of 
remembering  poems  of  so  great  a  length  was  used 
an  English  student  arose  who  recited  one  or  both 
of  these  great  epics  verbatim  ct  literatim  et  punctiia- 
tim.  A  similar  achievement  has  recently  occurred, 
the  recitation  of  Dante's  "  Divine  Comedy." 

There  is  no  absolutely  certain  evidence  that  there 


41 6    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

were  not  written  documents  in  the  Greek  of  that 
early  day.  Indeed,  it  has  been  positively  affirmed 
that  tablets  have  been  found  among  Egyptian  ruins 
containing  inscriptions  in  the  Greek  of  that  period. 
It  is  also  well  known  that  blindness  is  usually  ac- 
companied by  great  tenacity  of  verbal  memory. 
We  know  that  about  the  time  of  the  Christian  era 
there  were  critics  called  "Separatists,"  who  main- 
tained that  the  "  Iliad  "  and  the  "  Odyssey  "  were  the 
work  of  different  poets  ;  but  both  that  theory  and 
its  modification,  brought  forth  by  Wolfe  in  1795, 
tax  our  credulity  more  than  a  belief  in  the  exist- 
ence of  Homer  as  a  historical  character.  It  is 
simply  begging  the  question  to  say  that  no  poet 
could  compose  and  retain  in  memory  works  of  so 
great  a  length  ;  it  also  greatly  taxes  our  credulity 
to  believe  that  there  were  many  poets  in  Greece, 
or  in  any  other  country  in  any  age,  who  could 
write  as  did  Homer.  It  has  been  jokingly  said 
that  Homer's  poems  were  not  written  by  Homer, 
but  by  anothei  man  of  the  same  name.  If  it  is 
difficult  to  believe  in  one  Homer,  it  is  surely  much 
more  difficult  to  believe  in  a  dozen  Homers.  The 
criticism  regarding  the  historical  character  of  Moses 
will  have  its  day  as  did  that  concerning  Homer, 
but  both  Homer  and  Moses  will  live  after  all  their 
critics  are  dead  and  forgotten. 

It  is  well  for  many  of  the  critics  of  Moses  that 
he  has  now  been  a  long  time  in  heaven.  When 
he  was  upon  the  earth  he  certainly  proved  himself 
to  be  a  foeman  worthy  of  the  steel  of  his  bravest 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF   THE    MINISTER     417 

antagonists.  Those  who  tilted  against  him  always 
suffered  in  the  encounter.  Pharaoh  went  down 
before  Moses  like  lead  into  the  Red  Sea,  and  Jan- 
nes  and  Jambres,  the  Egyptian  magicians,  remain 
on  the  page  of  the  New  Testament  as  solemn  wit- 
nesses to  their  utter  defeat  at  the  hand  of  Moses, 
the  majestic  lawgiver,  the  illustrious  leader,  the 
sublime  poet,  and  one  of  the  divinest  men  God  has 
yet  given  to  the  world.  Doubtless,  the  Pentateuch 
is,  without  intending  any  pun  upon  the  word,  a 
mosaic.  Moses  was  a  sensible  man,  and  he  availed 
himself  of  all  accessible  documents.  It  is  barely 
possible  that  William  Shakespeare  will  endure  after 
Ignatius  Donnelly  shall  have  been  forgotten  ;  so 
will  Moses  after  his  critics  have  been  dead  for  cen- 
turies. One  grows  utterly  weary  of  the  microscopic 
criticism  often  applied  to  various  parts  of  the  Penta- 
teuch, separating  it  into  sections  with  a  wearisome 
display  of  divisional  vagaries,  indicated  by  the 
letters  of  the  alphabet.  If  the  plays  of  Shakes- 
peare, the  poems  of  Milton,  chapters  of  Macaulay, 
or  the  orations  of  Daniel  Webster,  were  submitted 
to  similar  treatment,  the  authors  and  their  writings 
would  be  made  inexpressibly  ludicrous.  We  need 
to  be  conservatively  progressive,  or  progressively 
conservative.  Let  no  one's  faith  be  disturbed  ;  let 
no  one  rush  to  support  God's  Ark  lest  its  bearers 
should  stumble  and  it  should  fall.  We  have  God's 
own  triumphant  word  regarding  his  own  eternal 
book,  "  The  grass  withereth,  the  flower  fadeth ; 
but  the  word  of  our  God  shall  stand  forever." 


41 8    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

The  prophet  must  be  in  Hving  touch  with  his 
age.  Large  portions  of  the  Old  Testament  consist 
of  denunciations  of  the  sins  of  the  hour,  and  of 
poHtical  sermons  on  the  relations  of  Israel  with 
adjoining  nations.  We  are  to  preach  Christ  and 
him  crucified,  but  this  kind  of  preaching  includes 
every  interest  of  the  human  race.  When  the 
words  of  Terence,  "I  am  a  man,  and  nothing  com- 
mon to  man  is  foreign  to  me,"  were  pronounced  in 
a  Roman  theatre  they  elicited  tumultuous  applause. 
The  true  prophet  of  God  can  say,  "  I  am  a  man, 
and  nothing  common  to  men  for  whom  Christ  died, 
is  foreign  to  the  pulpit  that  pleads  in  his  name." 
The  pulpit  ought  to  be  the  great  leader  in  all  phil- 
anthropic movements.  Christian  teachers  ought 
not  to  allow  infidel  lecturers,  or  even  Christian  or- 
ganizations outside  of  the  church,  to  surpass  the 
church  in  all  humane  endeavors,  philanthropic  pur- 
suits, and  humanizing  and  divinizing  agencies. 

It  is  to  the  humiliation  of  the  pulpit  that  it  so 
often  has  opposed  radical  reform  movements  until 
they  had  become  victorious,  and  then  it  had  to 
take  an  apologetic  and  a  cringing  attitude  when  it 
ought  to  have  been  crowned  with  honor  as  the 
leader  of  the  reform.  The  pulpit  may  not  preach 
partisan  politics  ;  but  it  must  patriotically  lift  up 
its  voice  in  favor  of  moral  principles  as  applied  to 
political  parties  and  platforms.  There  is  no  sliding 
scale  in  the  Decalogue.  The  eighth  commandment 
has  not  been  expunged  from  the  divine  law.  It  is 
no  more  difficult  to  understand  moral  questions  as 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     419 

related  to  politics  than  as  related  to  any  other 
subject.  It  has  been  said  that  there  is  no  place  for 
the  Sunday-school  in  politics  ;  it  was  also  said  by  a 
brilliant  Western  senator  that  the  Ten  Command- 
ments and  the  Golden  Rule  were  an  iridescent 
dream.  This  senator  was  elected  to  remain  at 
home  to  study  the  iridescence  of  his  dream,  while 
some  Christian  politicians  endeavored  to  realize 
these  high  ideals  in  political  activities.  We  give 
all  politicians  fair  warning  that  the  Sunday-school 
is  in  politics,  and  that  the  pulpit  is  in  politics  and 
will  stand  for  the  Ten  Commandments  and  the 
Golden  Rule  as  the  foundation  of  the  republic's 
hope  and  as  the  brightest  glory  of  the  republic's 
resplendent  flag.  The  pulpit  will  to-day  show  the 
world  that  America  stands  not  for  anarchy,  but  for 
law  ;  not  for  repudiation,  but  for  national  honor ; 
not  for  sectionalism  and  dishonesty,  but  for  patriot- 
ism, for  piety,  for  truth,  and  for  God. 

THE  MINISTER  THE  IMPERSONATOR  OF  GOD'S 
THOUGHTS. 

In  the  third  place,  the  true  minister  is  to  be  the 
impersonator  of  the  thoughts  of  God.  He  is  to 
live  over  again  the  life  of  the  Lord  Jesus  ;  he  is  to 
incarnate  the  spirit  which  actuated  the  divine 
Master  from  his  cradle  to  his  cross,  and  from  his 
cross  to  his  throne.  He  is  to  be,  in  his  measure, 
Christ  to  the  world.  He  must,  like  the  Master 
himself,  go  about  doing  good.  He  is  to  be  the 
Shepherd  of  souls.      He  is  to  have  in  charge  the 


420    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

cure  of  the  sin-sick.  He  is  to  be  a  cure  among 
men.  He  must  develop  a  character  which  will  give 
power  to  all  the  words  of  his  mouth  and  the  sen- 
tences of  his  pen.  The  power  of  character  is  in- 
calculable ;  character  must  be  behind,  above,  be- 
neath, and  before  every  sermon,  poem,  and  picture 
of  artist,  poet,  or  preacher.  It  is  the  man  behind 
the  words  which  gives  them  their  power.  It  has 
been  well  said  that,  "Character  is  the  diamond 
that  scratches  every  other  stone."  Personality  is 
immortal,  and  the  personality  imbued  with,  inspired 
by,  and  consecrated  to,  Jesus  Christ  is  simply  irre- 
sistible. Wellington  said  that  Napoleon's  presence 
in  the  French  army  was  equivalent  to  forty  thou- 
sand additional  soldiers  ;  and  it  was  said,  "  You 
could  not  stand  with  Burke  under  an  archway 
while  a  shower  of  rain  was  passing  without  observ- 
ing that  he  was  an  extraordinary  man."  Franklin 
recognized  that  while  he  was  a  bad  speaker,  having 
much  hesitance  in  his  choice  of  words,  and  being 
hardly  accurate  in  his  language,  his  known  integ- 
rity of  character  gave  him  his  remarkable  power 
over  men. 

Behind  all  that  any  historian  may  say  of  the 
great  characters  of  whom  he  writes,  there  is  a  name- 
less element  which  was  the  secret  of  their  power 
and  which  no  historian  can  describe  in  words. 
Charles  James  Fox  could  not  be  Prime  Minister  of 
England  because  England  distrusted  the  sincerity 
of  his  character  in  his  more  private  relations.  Wil- 
liam Pitt  towered  above  him  and  won  the  honors 


THE    TRUE    FUNCTION    OF    THE    MINISTER     42 1 

which  would  have  been  Fox's  but  for  his  fatal  lack 
of  transparent  character  and  assured  virtue.  It  is 
this  nameless  element,  as  has  been  suggested, 
which  gave  power  to  Moses  at  the  Red  Sea,  to 
Leonidas  at  Thermopylae,  to  Nelson  at  the  Nile,  to 
Wolfe  at  Quebec,  to  Washington  at  Yorktown,  to 
Grant  at  Vicksburg,  to  Sheridan  at  Winchester,  to 
Carey  in  India,  to  Judson  in  Burma,  and  to  thou- 
sands more  in  other  heroic  crises  of  life.  Finely 
did  Emerson  say,  "What  care  I  for  what  you  say, 
when  what  you  do  sits  over  my  head  and  thunders 
so  loud  that  I  cannot  hear  what  you  say?  "  The 
prophet  of  God  should  be  as  transparent  as  plate 
glass,  and  he  should  be  as  erect  as  the  alabaster 
columns  in  St.  Mark's  in  Venice. 

We  need  not  so  much  more  men  in  the  pulpit  as 
we  need  more  man  in  the  pulpit  and  in  the  pew. 
The  whole  world  to-day  is  looking  for  men.  The 
search  was  never  so  arduous  and  the  discovery  was 
never  so  highly  appreciated  as  at  this  hour.  The 
whole  world  has  written  over  every  profession  : 
"Wanted — A  man."     One  has  put  it  thus  : 

Wanted  ;  men  : 
Not  systems  fit  and  wise, 
Not  faiths  with  rigid  eyes, 
Not  wealth  in  mountain  piles, 
Not  power  with  gracious  smiles, 
Not  even  the  potent  pen  : 
Wanted  ;  men. 

No  profession  is  more  in  need  of  manhood  of 
the  highest  order  than  the  profession  of  the  minis- 


422    CURRENT    QUESTIONS    FOR    THINKING    MEN 

try ;  only  the  great  God  can  estimate  the  power  of 
such  men  in  their  own  churches,  in  their  own  de- 
nominations, and  to  Christianity  and  the  world  in 
their  broadest  reaches.  Such  men  give  direction 
to  the  thoughts  of  their  generation  ;  they  interpret 
God  to  men,  and  men  to  themselves.  They  open 
vast  possibilities  to  churches  and  communities. 

My  heart  grows  tender  as  I  see  a  body  of  young 
men  going  out  into  the  ministry.  Subtle  tempta- 
tions await  them  ;  marvelous  possibilities  beckon 
them  forward  ;  glorious  opportunities  stand  before 
them  with  open  doors  ;  but  terrible  precipices  are 
near  all  these  grand  possibilities.  They  must  ever 
sit  as  students  at  the  feet  of  Jesus  Christ ;  they 
must  ever  be  brave  in  declaring  the  truth  as  proph- 
ets of  God  ;  and  they  must,  above  and  beyond  all 
besides,  be  true  to  themselves,  to  their  calling,  and 
to  their  God  in  their  innermost  souls.  If  true  to 
themselves  in  the  highest  sense,  as  the  great  drama- 
tist has  taught  us,  they  can  never  be  false  to  their 
fellow-men.  May  God  help  us  to  walk  worthy  of 
our  high  calling,  of  our  sublime  possibilities,  and 
of  our  divine  and  enthroned  Prophet,  Priest,  and 
King,  the  peerless,  glorious,  divine  Jesus  Christ ! 
Of  every  minister  of  Jesus  Christ  it  ought  to  be 
said,  in  some  measure  at  least : 

The  elements 
so  mixed  in  him  that  nature 

might  stand  up, 
and  say  to  all  the  world  : 

'This  was  a  man.' 


Princeton  Theological ,  Semmanf  Libra^ 


1 1012  01236  2929 


DATE  DUE 

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GAYLORO 

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